


Painful Lies and Hard-Earned Truths

by ice_hot_13



Category: SSX Tricky
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-06-22
Updated: 2012-06-22
Packaged: 2017-12-15 19:46:57
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 18
Words: 37,706
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/853359
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ice_hot_13/pseuds/ice_hot_13
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Viggo and Nate are sharing a room, and one word sets off a disagreement that means more to each than they're willing to let on. That word? "boyfriend." Enough said.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Boyfriend?

 Viggo was lying on his back on the floor of the lodge's living room, before the fireplace. The other racers were milling about, some out practicing, others having lunch elsewhere. Viggo thumbed through a glossy magazine he'd been trying to be interested in for the past hour. It hadn't worked for the past hour, and it wasn't working now. Frustrated, he slapped the covers together and half flung it away from him so it slid under the chair where Elise was sitting.

"Would you like something else to read?" she asked mildly, reaching under the chair and picking it up. "Something that would perhaps make you less angry?"

"Nnnnnn" Viggo growled. She arched an eyebrow.

"What's wrong?"

"Nothing." He was lying. She knew it, he knew it, and even Griff, who'd just walked into the room, knew it.

"What's up, Viggo?" He hopped over the couch and flopped down, his foot nearly making contact with Elise's head.

"Would it kill you to walk around?" she gave Griff a stern look.

"Sorry."

"Hey, Griff, Mac was looking for you." Viggo called over to him. "Something about letting you borrow his new video game."

"Wow, really?!" Griff leaped up and raced from the room.

"Mac's gone" Elise said, flipping through the magazine Viggo had thrown. "He and a bunch of other people went into town for the day." The only ones at the lodge were Viggo, Elise, Moby, Zoe, Allegora, Nate and Psymon, everyone else had gone for the day.

"I know." They were both silent for a few minutes.

"Sure nothing's wrong?" Elise ventured again. Viggo turned away.

"I'm fine." Again, he was lying, so obviously it was painful. Viggo had been told to room with Nate, and it had been going fine, for the first few weeks. Then Viggo's ex-boyfriend had called him- they were still friends, and he just wanted the name of some place or other- and Viggo had made the mistake of telling Nate who it was.

"You have a boyfriend?" Nate had looked so shocked Viggo had been offended, and more than a little hurt.

"I did." Viggo had said shortly, going to leave.

" _You_ like  _guys?"_ Again, Nate had sounded so surprised, it sounded almost like horror. Viggo had snarled some confirming response and slammed the door so hard he'd scared the hell out of Kaori, who'd been walking down the hall at that precise moment. After screaming at the sudden noise, she'd asked Viggo what was wrong, and he'd been lying ever since.

‑­

Viggo glared into the fire, not about to admit anything to Elise. It wouldn't have been so bad, or something he'd even remotely care about, if only it hadn't been  _Nate_ saying it. That made it important. That made it hurt.

"I don't think you're doing that great." Elise interrupted his dark musings.

"You always say that" he replied smugly.

"I mean it this time." That shut him up. "I'm serious, Viggo. What's wrong?"

"I dunno." He answered, more than half truthful.

"Now I'm really worried about you."

"Yeah?" he asked, only half interested.

"Yes. What is it?" She just didn't feel right, watching the normally vibrant Viggo be so… depressed. It didn't seem right, and she was going to fix it.

He told her about the morning, about the phone call and the conversation and the door slamming. "I don't see why you'd care" She said once he was done. "Everyone here already knew you're gay."

"I know that. And I don't care that he knows." Viggo lifted one hand in a questioning little gesture. "I just… it's not that." Their conversation was stopped short when Allegora came into the room in a huff. She threw herself onto the couch, pouting.

"Get called a little poser again?" Elise asked with false compassion. Allegora made a face at her.

"Go jump off a cliff." She stuck her tongue out at Elise, looking around for something to throw at her.

"Later, dudettes and Swede" Psymon walked out, snowboard in hand. "I'll be causing an avalanche, be back in a month." The door closed behind him. Allegora crossed her arms over her chest, clearly fuming about something. Viggo lay back on the floor, hands behind his head, staring up at the ceiling. He tried not to go over and over the scene from that morning, but his thoughts didn't exactly comply. The more he thought about it, the madder he got. And the more he felt like bursting into tears. He refused to give into either.

 

 


	2. Cowboys, Swedes, and that smile: Before

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> ("Before" denotes flashback chapter; "Now" means present-time)

"You think they could just coordinate their stupid flights to all come at the same time" Allegra tipped back her chair onto two legs so she could see the clock. "Ugh, move, moron" she muttered under her breath as a guy stood in her view, right in front of the clock on the wall of the restaurant.

"We've only been here, what, an hour?" Elise sipped her ice tea, rolling her eyes. "Calm down."

"I don't like waiting."

"Well, I don't like you, so I guess we're even, huh?" Elise started braiding her long blonde hair idly, pretending she didn't see Allegra glowering at her.

"Who're we even waiting for?"

"Well, let's see…" Elise made a big show of looking around. "I'm going to guess… everyone."

"Ha, ha. Who's coming?" Allegra swiped Elise's drink and took a drink. Elise reached forward to swipe it back, and Allegra leaned back in her chair so Elise wouldn't be able to reach. "And  _when?!"_

"Let's see…" Elise gave up on getting her drink back. "Mac and Zoe are on the same flight, they should come in ten minutes. Moby should get here in fifteen, Psymon is already here-"

"Why'd he get to go to the lodge already?" Allegra whined.

"Have you ever tried making Psymon be patient? Bad things happen."

"You exaggerate" Allegra said stubbornly. Elise held up her hands in doubt.

"Whatever. Kaori's getting here tomorrow morning, she's coming the farthest. Nate's coming in half an hour, Griff and Viggo at the same time, on a different plane. Unless a plane gets delayed" Elise said with a slightly sinister smile. "Then we'll be here even longer."

"Auuugghhh" Allegra slammed her chair back down, making several people at the café stare.

"Can you go anywhere without making a scene?" Elise snapped.

"Course she can't" A voice cut in, "people always watch disasters, don't they?" Zoe was standing beside their table, a backpack slung over her shoulder, wearing a tight T shirt and cargo pants, with new lime green streaks in her hair.

"Nice to have you back, Zoe" Allegra laughed. "The circuit needs that dose of sarcasm."

‑­

"Zoe, wasn't Mac on your flight?" Elise asked, standing up from the table. Zoe nodded.

"He's over there." Zoe waved a hand towards the terminal. The three watched Mac struggle out of the crowd, which hadn't done much to let him through. He spotted them and came over.

"Yo. Thanks for waiting for me, Zoe" he added sarcastically. Zoe shrugged a shoulder. Mac looked the same as he had the previous circuit, give or take. A tad bit taller, hair a little longer, but Elise could have sworn he still had the same jacket. Peeking out of his pocket was a handheld game, sleek and shiny black.

"Ooh" Allegra pulled it out of his pocket and started to press buttons.

"Don't touch it" Mac snatched it back, cradling it as if it were made of hair-thin crystal. "It's brand new" he all-but cooed. "Newest on the market… new game, highest quality graphics, everything a gamer could ever dream of…"

"And people wonder why you've got no social life" Zoe dropped her backpack from her shoulder.

"Ow!" Mac jerked his foot back and glared at her. "Are you insulting my game?"

"Let's see… yes. Yes, I believe I am. Imagine that." Zoe wasn't paying him much attention, standing on her toes to see over the crowd. "Look, there's Moby." Moby was winding his way through the people, and waved when he saw Zoe.

"What's up, mates? Where's the rest of the crew?" He tossed his backpack on the floor next to Zoe's.

"Coming pretty soon." Elise went to get herself another iced tea, as Allegra had stolen most of her first one. Zoe beat Mac to her vacant chair. Mac dragged over another metal chair, sitting as far away from Allegra as possible. Allegra didn't even notice him, she'd taken out her cell phone and flipped it open.

"Hello?" There was a pause. "You're stupid. You know that, right? Yeah, I kind of figured. It's kind of funny really. No, really, it is. You're so pathetic, it's- hello? Hellooooo?" She flipped it closed. "That was Nate."

"Is he here?" Moby asked. Allegra nodded.

"He's a little lost."

"I didn't hear you give him any directions." Zoe had taken Moby's phone from his pocket and was playing a game on it.

"He hung up." Allegra shrugged. "Something about how he'd rather find us for himself than have to listen to me, or whatever…"

"You'd scare off anyone" Moby remarked, getting up. "Dunno about you guys, but I want a soda or something. Right back." He headed off towards the café.

Another fifteen minutes passed before Nate finally came into view, from the direction opposite the terminal where he'd arrived.

‑­

"You weren't kidding when you said you got lost" Allegra remarked as he walked up to their table.

"Thanks for the help." Nate shrugged off his dark green jacket, slinging it over his shoulder. Elise arched an eyebrow at this. Nate had on a short sleeved shirt underneath the jacket, which showed off strong arms and broad shoulders. Elise had fairly high standards, and Nate didn't quite qualify, but even she would admit that he had a handsome, almost rugged look about him, and that his chiseled features only added to the overall attractive cowboy look.

"Isn't everyone here yet?" Allegra asked impatiently. Elise shook her head no.

"Can't you count?"

"Well" Moby said, arriving again, having found nothing to his liking at the café, "Howdy, cowboy. About time you showed up. You get lost or something?"

"No" Nate scowled. Moby laughed.

"I knew it. You always get lost in airports." Nate shrugged and said nothing about it, wanting to retain even a shred of dignity. Mac glanced up from his game.

"You got lost  _again?"_ he said, effectively demolishing the image.

"Yeah" Nate confessed, letting his backpack fall from his shoulder to rest at his feet. "Airports are confusing, okay? And it's usually not even my fault, because  _some people_ like to give me false direction" he tossed a look at Allegra, who stared up at the ceiling like he wasn't even there.

"Wow!" A voice exclaimed. A twelve-year old blonde boy came running over. "That's so cool!"

"Hands off, Griff" Mac slid his chair back a few feet to protect his new game. Griff pouted.

"You're the worst at sharing."

"So what?"

"Griff!" A voice called out. Griff didn't even turn around. A guy struggled over, carrying both his own backpack, and dragging Griff's bag as well. "What did you pack in here, rocks?"

"No" Griff protested. "Just my laptop, all my games and DVDs because I didn't want them to get hurt, and the game manuals, and-" He deposited the bag at Griff's feet. Nate glanced over at him. This was obviously the guy that had been new last circuit, the one Nate hadn't attended, having been in Europe instead. This guy was Nate's age, and had messy blonde hair and deep brown eyes; his face was almost made him appear innocent, with the soft angles and ski-jump shaped nose. He was lithe and tall, but it was still apparent that he spent time working out.

"Hey" he turned to Nate, "I don't think we've met. I'm Viggo, you've gotta be Nate."

"Am I that famous?" Nate tried to figure out why he was suddenly so tongue-tied. Something- he recognized the feeling, like he'd known a lesser degree, but  _what-_

‑­

"I've heard all about you" Viggo confirmed. "About being the cowboy of the pack." He gave Nate a vibrant smile.

Nate recognized it then. He couldn't quite understand  _why,_ but, as he followed the others towards the baggage claim, lagging at the back of the group, he realize he knew the reason, even if he wasn't going to admit it. Not even to himself.

……………..

"You're kidding" Nate breathed, reading the list again, as if that would change anything.

"What?" Moby elbowed him out of the way to see the list of roommates. Nate stepped back, keeping his gaze on the list the tour director had pinned to the bulletin board in the lodge's living room.

"Nothing. Where is everyone?" Nate shoved his hands in his jeans pockets, while Moby scanned the list.

"Some people went swimming."

"Uh… where? There's no pool here." Moby shrugged.

"Some place in town. There're coming back in about fifteen minutes or so, I think." Moby shrugged. "You're rooming with Viggo, huh?" Moby crossed the room and flopped down on the couch. Nate nodded mutely. "Good luck with that, cowboy"

"Huh? Why?" Nate sank down into one of the armchairs. Moby reached for one of the magazines that had been left on the coffee table. He picked up the fashion one, snickering.

"Man, everyone's got the oddest reading habits around here. Cars, plants, food, fashion…" he went through a few.

"Give me that" Elise came over, snatching up the glossy magazine. Moby picked up the sports one.

"Oh, Viggo's not the worst roommate in the world, but man is he messy." Moby shook his head. "And then he'll lose something, and turn the place upside down looking for it."

"Oh." Nate fell silent again. He almost said something, almost. "I'm gonna go, uh, find my room and, um- yeah."

Nate didn't get much unpacking done. He'd gotten as far as setting his suitcase on the ottoman at the end of one of the two beds and opened it, but that was it. Now he was sitting on the edge of the bed, examining his sunglasses.

And wondering why just the thought of  _him_ made his thoughts spin.

"Hey" Viggo's voice made Nate look up quickly. Viggo stood in the doorway; there were still droplets of water on his skin, and his blonde hair was a mess. He dragged his suitcase into the room, heaving it onto the bench at the end of his own bed. "Shoulda come swimming, it was awesome." He started going through his suitcase, looking for a shirt. Nate looked back to his packing, trying to hide how his thoughts were reeling.

"Yeah, maybe next time, when it's not freezing cold…" Viggo laughed at that.

‑­

"Not tough enough?" He pulled a shirt on, and made a sad attempt to fix his hair, which remained sticking up.

"Something like that." Nate said, watching Viggo toss things from his suitcase onto the bed, in search of a jacket. "Moby was right, you are messy."

"Moby would say so" Viggo held up a jacket, then tossed it onto the bedspread. "Then again, he's the one who's got a million pairs of boots."

"I heard that!" Moby stuck his head through the doorway, as Viggo hadn't bothered to shut the door. "You guys coming ? Everyone's taking a practice race."

"Sure we will." Viggo said for both of them. "Hang on just two minutes and we'll be there."

Only ten minutes after Viggo's estimated two, they'd joined the other riders on the gondola heading up the mountain to the top of the course.

"Honestly, Griff, you're going to kick someone" Elise inspected her nails, glancing up only briefly at Griff, who was swinging around the pole in the centre of the gondola. Griff pouted and sat down next to Mac.

"Are you sure I can't borrow-" he started to ask, before being silenced by a look of death from Mac.

"Why don't you wait another thousand years and ask me then" Mac said stubbornly. Allegra and Psymon were standing by the door, something that made everyone nervous. The pair had already been warned that if anything got broken or dismantled during the short trip, bad things would happen to them.

"if I licked that pole, do you think my tongue would stick to it?" Viggo asked from where he was sprawled on the bench beside Nate, an arrangement Nate couldn't recall having a say in. Nonetheless, Viggo was lying down on the bench, his head next to Nate's knee.

"And you're thinking about licking it because…?" Nate turned around to look out the window, instead of at the curious expression on Viggo's face.

"Because I can't bite it" Viggo replied matter-of-factly.

"And you bite things often?"

"Oh, yes" Viggo said, sounding mysterious and- Nate couldn't believe the description even came to mind- seductive. And that smile sure wasn't helping matters much.  _That smile,_ Nate thought, watching as they passed over the snow,  _is going to drive me absolutely crazy._

He was thankful when they finally arrived and the ten riders got off the gondola. Within two minutes, they were racing down the mountainside, and Nate was able to shortcut his way ahead of most of the others, and keep Viggo out of his sightline.

Keeping the blonde out of his thoughts, however, was proving to be much more of a challenge.

……………………..

 


	3. Nonexistent Mountain Lions and Doors:Now

  _Wham._

Moby jerked away from the tree he'd been leaning against, looking up in bewilderment. He'd been calmly standing there, waiting for Zoe to happen along so he could ask if they could go boarding together, and-

_Wham._

Something smashed into the tree somewhere above his head, and snow rained down on him. He took a step back, wondering briefly if there was a mountain lion poised above his head or something, waiting for the kill, and Moby started writing his will in his mind, just in case, so he could say something interesting on his deathbed, which was surely-

_Wham._

No, he realized, it was just a snowball. Calmed down considerably, he started looking for the culprit. It didn't take long to find Nate, standing a few yards away on the other side of the tree, crushing a snowball between his fingers and glaring at the snow.

"Hey, mate-"

_Wham._

"What's  _up_  with you, cowboy?" he called out. Nate flinched at the sound of his voice.

"Oh, sorry, didn't see you…" he let the snow fall through his fingers, anger draining away visibly as he tried to hide that he was ever angry at all.

"Too busy trying to take down the tree, I guess." Moby started over cautiously. "Did it offend you or something?" Nate shrugged a shoulder silently, dark brown eyes smoldering. "Did… ah… someone else? Besides the tree?"

"The tree did nothing." Nate informed him sullenly. Moby blinked at the sheer uselessness of the remark.

"Okay, good start. So it's someone else." Nate didn't reply. "Were you trying to kill  _me_?"

"No. I didn't see you, sorry…" Nate scuffed at the snow with the toe of his boot, looking sheepish.

"No worries, cowboy. So, who're you mad at? Don't tell me Psymon barricaded the door to your room too-"

"No, it's not that." Nate bent to scoop up more snow. "Did he really do that?"

"Bloody hell, mate, he dragged over a piano stool and a chair. I opened the door and it all fell on me. Okay, so if it wasn't Psymon… are you really gonna make me go through everyone?"

"Looks like it" Nate answered unhelpfully. Moby sat down on a log to think it through.

"Okay. I can do that. Tell me if I get to it, though, you promise?" Nate said nothing. "I'll take that as a yes. So… uh, Griff?"

"Who could get mad at Griff?"

"Probably no one. Except Mac, although that's probably because Griff had taken his new video game without asking… I heard him yelling about it a few minutes ago. Okay, Mac?" Nate shook his head no. "Did Zoe do something to you? She already threw Psymon through a window."

"Not surprising."

"No kidding. Uh… oh, it's Elise, isn't it?! Dude, she turns down everyone, don't take it personally, it's because she's got this killer way of playing hard to get, and she's sort of determined to date a model guy or something, so it's like, seriously, wait  _on_ , but-"

"Why would I ask out Elise?" Nate asked. Moby shrugged.

"Don't you like her?"

"Not like that." Nate started shaping more snow into a snowball.

"Okay, okay, it was just a guess. Ah… Viggo?" Seeing Nate tighten his hold on the snow, Moby was willing to bet that was it. "Ah-hah! I've got it, haven't I?"

"Congratulations." Nate said dryly, starting to walk away.

"Woah, woah, don't leave, mate." Moby was glad to see Nate stop. "what's happening between you and Viggo?"

"Nothing, okay?" Nate snapped, crossing his arms over his chest. "It's nothing." He kicked at the snow with the toe of his book again, growling when he hit a rock instead. " _Nothing_."

"If you don't tell me, I'll tell Psymon you're the one who broke his new goggles this morning" Moby said cheerfully. Nate growled.

"Blackmailing me, I see. He'd kill me if he found out!"

"Oh, yes. For sure. Tell me." He leaned forwards, elbows propped on his knees, watching Nate earnestly.

"Why do you even want to know?!"

"They don't call me the guidance counselor for nothing." Moby said. Nate gave him a confused look.

"They  _don't_ call you the guidance counselor, at all."

­"Yeah, well, still. Look. Point is, I won't tell, I can help, you should tell me, you need to."

"Why do I need to?" Nate protested stubbornly.

"Because next time you go flinging snow at trees, you might hit someone who won't be so nice about getting hit." Nate debated for a moment, then sat next to him on the log.

"I said something to Viggo this morning I shouldn't have."

"Now we're getting somewhere. What happened?"

"Someone called him, I asked who it was out of curiosity, he said it was his ex-boyfriend."

"… _and?"_ Moby prompted. Nate sighed heavily.

"And I said, you have a boyfriend? And he said, yeah, he did, and I said ' _you_ like  _guys?'_ because, you know, I couldn't believe it… and he got real mad, he left and slammed the door… Kaori screamed, I think he scared her with that… and I just… I don't know." Nate shook his head slowly. "I just… it was a stupid thing to say, but I just… I couldn't believe it, you know? I couldn't, it's just so…"

"So  _what?_ " Moby asked, an edge of reproach to his tone. Nate gave him an indignant look, like Moby had just accused him of something so offending it was absurd.

"Dude, it's not  _like_  that."

"What?" Moby asked innocently, as if he'd never implied anything.

"I'm not saying I don't like him for it or anything, it's not that, I don't even care that he is, it doesn't make a difference to me, why would it, so don't even give me any of that, because it's  _not-"_

"Okay. You're not homophobic and you're not gay, we've established that, but my God are you quick to take offense. So why's it such a big deal?" Nate was completely silent. Moby ran through his words in his mind, wondering what he'd said. "Basically, that's the only thing that changed that you knew about him-"

"That's exactly it." Nate said flatly. "That's what changed."

"Huh?" Nate stood up, brushing snow off his jeans.

"Before that, I was... safe, okay? That's it. I felt safer."

"Mate, what do you think he's gonna-"

"It's not what he might do." Nate cut in sharply. "It's what I might do." With that, he stalked off, furious beyond words because of something Moby couldn't even recognize having been there at all.

"I don't get it" Moby mumbled, standing. "Crazy cowboy…"

"Why's he crazy now?" Elise's voice made Moby look up. She was leaning against her propped-up snowboard, watching him coolly.

"I kind of, uh, can't tell you-"

"Doesn't matter, I heard everything except the beginning. Who was he talking about?"

"I really-"‑­

"Moby, I'll tell Zoe that you sing in the shower." She gave him a calm smile. Moby gaped at her. She just kept smiling, looking like she was simply posing for a snowboarding advertisement.

"What?! How do you know that?!"

"Griff told me, he knows from when you guys roomed together. So? Who?" She waited patiently, cool smile unnerving him.

"Viggo" He finally spat out. "Don't tell either I told you, got it?"

"Absolutely" With a last unsettlingly composed smile, she started back in the direction of the lodge. Moby was debating following her, but then Zoe walked by, and he ran to catch up with her instead. He didn't really want to get involved with Nate and whatever was going on, he'd rather have a go at the mountain lion. He'd have a better chance of survival…

……………………….

Griff walked through the door to the lodge. Then he stopped. He backed up onto the porch again and stared. Something was different here.

"Where's the door…?" The door was completely removed. He walked into the lodge again and up the stairs to the room he was sharing with Mac. That door was gone too. Griff walked down the hall, looking at all the rooms. Elise and Kaori's room had no door, he could see a pile of suitcases he assumed were Elise's, and heard the strains of a Japanese TV show.

"Kaori?" he poked his head into the room. She waved when she saw him.

"Griff-kun!"

"Where are all the doors?" she held up her hands in confusion.

"I do not know, but they are not here." Griff continued down the hall. Zoe and Allegra's room was missing a door too, and in their room, he saw a chaotic mess of clothes. Moby and Psymon's room was missing a door, too, and he saw a row of boots lined up at the end of a bed, and something like a chain under the other bed. Nate and Viggo's room was missing a door, too. Nate was sitting on the bed, bent over a mess of plastic and wires.

"Hey, Nate. What're you doing?" Nate looked up at him momentarily.

"Fixing my alarm clock. What about you?"

"Nothing, but um, what happened to it?" Griff ventured. Nate poked at the jumble of wires.

"I might have accidentally thrown it across the room." Nate shrugged a shoulder noncommittally.

"Kind of violent, huh?"

"I don't like waking up early." Nate answered emotionlessly. Griff paused at that; usually, that sort of remark would have elicited, at the very least, an indignant protest. But now, nothing.

"You okay?" Griff ventured.

‑­

"Fine. What'd you want?" Nate was purposely changing the subject, but Griff wasn't about to test his luck and push it.

"Where'd all the doors go?"

"The doors- woah, the door's gone!" Nate hadn't even noticed. Griff wondered if maybe he'd gotten hit in the head or something.

"So I guess that means you don't know anything?"

"Right on." Griff left to find his door. Walking through the kitchen, though, he saw that the back door is gone.

"You'd better not have anything to do with that" Elise said from the kitchen table. She was drinking coffee and reading.

"Nope. Do you drink anything besides coffee?" This earned him a murderous look, and he ran out the door. Once outside, Griff heard giggling. He followed the sound to the back of the lodge, but he didn't see anyone.

"Here, hold that" he heard Psymon's voice, and looked up. Psymon and Allegra were standing on the roof, by the chimney, and Allegra was holding the end of a rope that was wrapped around the chimney. The doors were tied to the chimney. "Yo, small fry!" Psymon caught sight of Griff. Griff froze, wondering if it would be safer to run for his life.

"uh… yeah?"

"Toss up that rope, would you?" Griff spotted a rope on the deck next to his foot. He picked it up and tried to throw it far enough to reach them. It fell short. "And you call yourself an athlete…" Psymon shook his head sadly. He was holding the doors against the chimney, tying a knot in the rope. "Hey, sweet stuff, help him out." This made Allegra smile brilliantly, and she rushed to shimmy down the drainpipe and snatch the rope from Griff's limp hands. Then she climbed back onto the roof.

"There you go" She handed it to Psymon proudly. He favored her with an incredibly rare smile. Griff thought it made him look even more psycho, but apparently, Allegra didn't notice that.

"Help me with this, then we can go collect other stuff." He said, wrapping the rope around the chimney.

"Ooh, like what?" Allegra grinned, something Griff found almost as unnerving as Psymon's smile. Psymon knotted the rope again. "How about gloves? And pillows?"

"You're a brilliant little chickie, aren't you?" Another smile that really freaked Griff out. "Let's do that." He started towards the edge of the room. Griff ran for the kitchen. He skidded around the corner and made Elise flinch when he came tearing through the doorway.

"Where's the fire?" she was now reapplying her lipstick. Griff saw the refrigerator, and the thought of food made him completely forget the absolute terror he'd had only a moment ago.

"Nowhere" he opened the refrigerator and stuck his head inside.

‑­"Did you find the doors?" Elise asked, reminding him of his fear.

"Doors? AAAAAHHHH!" Griff almost banged his head on the refrigerator door as he ran screaming from the room. Elise sighed and wondered if everyone was crazy. It didn't take her long to get the answer, as when she looked out the window, she saw Psymon and Allegra run by, each with an armful of pillows and smiling manically.

Yes, Elise thought, everyone was definitely crazy.

 

 


	4. Stained Glass: Now

"Stop watching me." Mac didn't even look up from his game. Mac was lying on his bed, while Griff watched TV, doing more staring at Mac's game than the TV.

"Can't I borrow it? For just one minute?"

"Not on your life." Mac was pressing buttons furiously, face a mask of concentration.

"Pleeeaaassse?"

"No. Isn't it, like, ten? Shouldn't you be going to bed or something?" There was a knock, though it couldn't have been at the door, as there still was one. "Go get that."

"I thought you wanted me to go to sleep."

"Griff!" Griff got up and went to the open doorway. Viggo stood in the hallway.

"Did you come to make Mac share his game?" Griff asked hopefully.

"Yo, Viggo. And give up already, Griff." Viggo shook his head no to Griff's question, and looked past him.

"Hey, Mac, can I sleep in here for tonight?"

"What's wrong with your room?" Mac was hardly paying attention to Viggo. Griff stepped back to let Viggo into the room.

"Please?"

"But you  _have_ a room, dude, with a bed. There's only two beds here."

"That's okay. I can sleep on the floor or something." Viggo said desperately. "C'mon, please?" Mac finally paused his game and looked up.

"Why? I've roomed with Nate before, dude, he's nothing like Psymon or even Moby, so what's the problem?" Viggo saw that Griff was listening to them curiously, so he went over to where Mac was lying and bent down to whisper.

"I just don't wanna be near Nate, okay? Please?" Viggo begged, not loud enough for Griff to hear. Mac sighed.

"If you want the floor, it's all yours. One condition, though." Mac added. Viggo waited, biting his lip. "I want to know why, alright?"

"Fine. I'll tell you later, okay?" he cast a look at Griff, and Mac understood that as soon as Griff was asleep, he'd find out.

"Cool. By the way, do you have a pillow?"

"Uh… no." Viggo looked confused. "I was gonna ask you that, there weren't any in our room."

"Psymon and Allegra took them." Griff said cheerily. Mac groaned.

…………………………

‑­Nate was in the kitchen, cup of coffee untouched, head down on the table. It wasn't that he was mad at Viggo- no, he doubted he ever really could be- but he just hated  _himself._ First he'd had to go and throw everything in his world into such a chaotic state that it was almost unrecognizable, and then he'd found the one thing that could make it better- not the same as before, but something different- and he'd gone and messed that up, too. He could have dealt with it in the beginning. Liking Viggo… it wasn't easy, it was a constant tug-of-war between what he felt and what he thought he should feel, but he would have coped. Falling in love with Viggo… that was significantly more difficult. It was harder to hide, but he'd done that too. Every smile, every word, every casual touch, and he'd been able to pretend like it hadn't effected him. It hadn't been easy, but he'd dealt. Then Viggo had given him that glimmer of a chance, and he'd promptly dashed it to pieces.

It was like when Nate had taken a class in stained glass, back in high school- his friend had tricked him into taking it with her- and after laboring to finish the stupid thing, he'd finally completed it, and just as he was lifting it to see it in the light, it had slipped from his fingers and shattered. All his hard work destroyed beyond repair. He couldn't even recognize the pieces as belonging to something whole and beautiful. And Nate was fairly positive that he'd just done the same thing with Viggo. Except… remembering Viggo's hurt look, maybe it was more than that. It hurt to lie to himself, to Viggo, and he felt like he'd earned the right to tell the truth. One truth, one hard-earned truth, that's all he wanted. He supposed that he had it easier than it could have been- he'd only known for, what, three weeks?- but still. He just wanted to confess everything, consequences be damned. But now he couldn't. It was like how he'd gotten cut so many times while making that stupid stained glass thing, and that after he'd finished, he hadn't even got to see it properly.

"Damn stained glass" he mumbled under his breath. "Never even got to see it in the light."

"What stained glass?" His head jerked up at the sound of Elise's voice. She was standing next to him, drinking the coffee he'd made for himself.

"That's mine."

"And now it's mine. So, do you normally talk to yourself?" Nate frowned and said nothing. "Anyhow. Why'd you say something like that to Viggo? Are you that much of a jerk?!" Although she'd broken into some sort of enraged state, her composure remained calm. Nate puzzled over that.

"I- you-" Nate stammered for a response for a moment, "How do you even know that?!"

"I was eavesdropping. Well?"

"Why would I tell you anything?"

"I suggest you do." Elise said, sipping his coffee. "Because I know something you don't know, and you ought to know it, believe me, and you'd be best off finding out for yourself."

"How about you stop talking in riddles and tell me?"

"I'll tell you when you tell me." Elise stared him down and Nate saw no way out of it. "Why's you say it like that to him?"  
"Because I couldn't believe it" Nate confessed, looking down at the tile so he couldn't see those icy blue eyes boring into his, "because before I knew that, I was… safe."

"How?"‑­

"I didn't think he was gay. So I was safe from ever… basically, there was never a chance." Elise took a moment to understand what he was saying. Nate waited for her to get it, to come to the same conclusion that he had.

"Nate- are you saying tha-" she started to say, but fell silent as Allegra walked in.

"Interesting." She said. Nate sighed, running a hand over his short brown hair.

" _Please_  tell me you weren't listening." Nate was almost pleading with her. Allegra played with the ends of her braids, giving him a suspicious smile.

"I was." She took the cup of coffee from Elise's hand, looked disappointed when she saw it was empty. "And do you want to know what I think about it?"

"Not particularly." She didn't appear to have heard Nate.

"You stupid cowboy, how could you do all this?" Her sudden anger made Nate look up quickly.

"Do what?" Allegra scowled at his obliviousness, and threw her hands up with exasperation.

"I just- augh! You stupid, stupid cowboy!" She screamed at him. Nate looked from the screaming brunette to Elise, who looked equally confused. "Go  _tell_ him already! If you've got  _any_ sense in you, you wouldn't take that chance!"

"What do you care, Allegra?" Elise asked.

"Yeah, what're you going to do about it?" Nate asked, which proved to be the wrong question. Allegra flung the coffee cup in Nate's direction, and he ducked quickly. The mug smashed against the wall, and Allegra calmed walked out.

"Tell him what?!" Nate yelled after her. She ignored him and slammed the door. The remaining two were silent. Through the window, they saw Allegra walk by, go up to Psymon, who was fixing something on his snowboard, yank him to his feet by his shirt, say a few words and then kiss him passionately.

"Guess she was speaking from, ah, personal experience?" Nate remarked. Elise gave him a look.

"Do you want me to throw something at you too?" Elise said flatly. Nate shook his head no, getting up.

"That was scary…" he mumbled, walking out of the room. He heard Elise pick up a cup, and sprinted out of the room.

Elise watched him run out, then taking the new cup over to the coffee pot.  _Could Nate really like Viggo?_ She took her coffee to the table, gazing out the window. There was no one outside there now, just the footprint-covered snow.  _Was that why he was acting so weird?_ She'd thought he was just high-strung by nature. Of course, she should have connected it to Viggo. Nate was only ever on edge when Viggo was around or mentioned.  _Stupid cowboy,_ she thought for a moment, with something vaguely akin to sympathy. Then she shook her head and dismissed the thought,  _what am I thinking? Of course he's not into Viggo. I'm just jumping to conclusions. Which I shouldn't do. Definitely not. I think we'd know if he was._

The races for the day kept the riders from talking to each other much throughout the day. By the evening, though, there were two main theories for each of the two topics, and everyone was part of one camp or the other. Moby was sitting in the front room of the lodge, along with most of the other boarders. Elise was reading, having taken the best armchair by the fire. Viggo was lying on the floor next to Mac, who was playing his game and ignoring Griff, as ‑­

the younger boy tried to look over Mac's shoulder to watch the screen. Zoe was sitting on the floor next to the couch, and Moby had the feeling she was tying his shoelaces together. Allegra and Psymon weren't there, and Kaori was reading. Nate was sitting at the point where the couch made a right angle, and Moby was staring at him. He had been watching TV, on the big screen above the fireplace, but nothing good was on, and a commercial had made him think. It had been, admittedly, just a dish soap commercial, and he wasn't sure how that had gotten his thoughts back to this, but still. Maybe it was because the dish soap was yellow, and Viggo was blonde? Or maybe because the name had an 'N' in it, which made him think of Nate's name? Moby wasn't really sure.

Moby was trying to decide which side he was on. The rumors had gone in circles all day, about the Viggo/Nate feud. Mac had let slip that Viggo had spent the night in his and Griff's room instead, and Allegora had told all she knew. So now there were two things to be considered, and each had two theories.

Topic one was why Viggo was so mad at Nate, and everyone had decided that either Nate had said something else that they just didn't know, or that Viggo didn't want Nate to know he was gay because he'd dated a friend of Nate's.

Topic two was why Nate had been such a jerk in the first place, and it was either, they'd decided, because he was a closet homophobe and was secretly deathly afraid that Viggo liked him, or because he'd realized that Viggo had been secretly dating his friend, and that the ex-boyfriend who had called was Nate's best friend.

Moby was staring at Nate, trying to decide. So far, the popular opinion was that Viggo had secretly dated Nate's friend, and that Nate was a homophobe.

"That's so cool!" Griff was exclaiming. Mac scowled and ignored him.

"Why don't you go bug Viggo or someone?"

"What'd I ever do to you?" Viggo asked. Moby resumed his staring, finding them and the show uninteresting.

"What?" Nate finally asked him.

"Nothing."

"Liar."

"Damn good at it, too." Moby grinned. Nate kicked him in the side.

"What?" he persisted. Moby shook his head no.

"If I told you that, I'd have to kill you."

"Not before I kill you. What?"

Viggo watched this exchange from the floor. He had his head on his folded arms, silent.  _Something about him,_ he thought, watching them argue,  _I can't believe that, after all this, I'm_ ** _still_** _crazy about him. Jerk._ Despite his anger, though, he still longed to go over there and kiss Nate senseless. Viggo could just imagine it, too vividly. Nate was half sprawled across the couch, and Viggo could envision going over there and straddling him, proceeding to kiss him, possibly ravaging him afterwards, and the thought made Viggo groan softly and hide his face in his arms.  _It'll never happen,_ he thought sadly. Mac glanced down at him.

"You still haven't told me" he whispered. Viggo made a whining noise.

"Everyone's around…" he mumbled. Mac continued playing his game, until he suddenly swore under his breath and turned it off.

‑­"Stupid life energy drainer…" he muttered angrily, reaching for the TV remote that was on the coffee table, and changing the channel from some car race to a movie.

"I was watching that, mate" Moby complained.

"Guess you're not anymore, huh?" A few minutes passed. Viggo's cell phone vibrated in his pocket, and he tugged it out and slid it open. There was a text message, from Mac, who was only a few feet away from him. It was a mere two sentences.

_so wats going on?? I kno wat happnd but Y r u SO MAD??_

Viggo sighed and texted back his reply.

_IDK. I just don't want to be around him cuz I think hes a total homophobe._

Mac replied immediately.

_I c. That could be pretty awkward. So if u hate him so much y r u thinkin bout him??_

Viggo glanced up at Mac, but Mac was busy warning Griff that if he touched the game, he'd lose all his fingers and possibly his whole arm, too, if his fingerprints got on the screen. Viggo texted Mac back, asking how in the world Mac knew Viggo was thinking about Nate. Mac's reply was immediate again.

_O idk, maybe b/c its obvious? Lol. u're thinking about f-ing him, rnt u?? seriously dude I kno evrythng :)_

Viggo couldn't find any way to deny that, so he slipped his phone back in his pocket. True, he was thinking about Nate. He refused to think about the personality reasons he liked Nate so much- that hurt too much to think about- but had little control over the rest. So, he was idly imagining kissing him, eventually sleeping with him, and, in the end, staying with him. But at the moment, Nate didn't even notice him. He was saying something to Moby, Viggo couldn't hear what, and Moby was grinning and shaking his head no. Nate looked mad about this, momentary anger gracing his perfect face. Viggo sighed and tried to stop thinking about Nate. It didn't work.

Elise was flourishing a magazine at Nate- the lodge was stocked with an unearthly number of magazines they'd all left around, because newspapers were too boring, and it was impossible for anyone to finish an actual book, what with all the noise.

"Stained glass" she said smugly. He made a sort of growling noise and refused to look.

Viggo's gaze strayed over there again, and he remembered the first time he'd started flirting with Nate. He hadn't really realized he was, of course, not until after the fact. Viggo liked to say he was blessed with being an unintentional flirt, but really, he felt it was something of a hindrance to him, because he never could tell when what he was doing would be taken as playing around, or hard-on flirting. So he'd ended up, basically, shamelessly hitting on Nate. But that had been okay, because the guy was a sexy cowboy, who soon became the only guy Viggo could think about.  _Bite me, bite me._  Damn, that had been hot. His whispering, teasing voice, and the way he'd looked so embarrassed afterwards and at the same time, Viggo knew he'd felt just as devilishly pleased.

At least, Viggo thought sadly, he'd thought so.

………………………

 


	5. Bite me, Bite me... You're Beautiful: Before

The boarders were headed back up to the mountain top for the third and final race of the day. Nate didn't know how, but somehow, he found himself near Viggo in the gondola again. Something like that seemed to have happened every day for the past week. Viggo was sitting on the bench, looking at the pole in the center of the gondola. His elbows were propped on his knees, chin in his hand, a look of thoughtful contemplation on his face.

"Please tell me you're not thinking about licking it again" Nate said. Viggo gave him a bright smile. "Or biting it." Nate added.

"Nope" Viggo confirmed. "Not the pole, anyways" He added, almost carelessly, as if he didn't know it was such a sexual innuendo. Nate hadn't noticed, though, he was preoccupied with watching Allegra and Psymon, who were standing by the door again. This time, though, he knew he'd seen a wrench in someone's hand.

"What else, then?" Nate asked, wondering what would happen if they did somehow disconnect the floor from the walls.

"I dunno…" Viggo grinned wolfishly. "You." he wrapped an arm around Nate's shoulder and making a biting motion towards him.

"No, I'd really rather you bit the pole" Nate stammered, unwilling to admit to himself the fact that his nerves were screaming only because Viggo was so close to him. Viggo shook his head and pulled away.

"Just kidding, cowboy. Although I'm sure you taste good." Another teasing smile, and Viggo had hopped up and crossed the gondola to talk Mac out of pummeling Griff to the ground. Nate tried to steady his breathing, trying to figure out what had just happened. Kaori, seated next to him, giggled.

"Is he always so-" he started to ask Kaori, and faltered for an explanation.

"Viggo-kun is a flirt" Kaori informed him. "He's just playing, he does that to everyone." Nate was strongly reminded of the puppies people always said were 'just playing' when, in fact, they were really quite damn serious about biting someone.

The gondola finally, mercifully, stopped, and they all got out. Nate had been trying to avoid Viggo, unsure of exactly what he'd do the next time- some pretty alarming things were coming to mind, stuff he usually associated with cute girls- when Viggo sauntered right up to him as they were walking from the gondola station to the base station, dragging his snowboard along behind him. Nate was carrying his own snowboard.

"I won't bite you" Viggo reassured him. The wind was playing with his blonde hair, and Nate refused to describe it as cute.

"That's good" Nate tried to sound casual, "cuz I'd have to bite you back." This proved to be the perfectly wrong thing to say, even though it was exactly what he truly wanted to say. Viggo smiled, looking incredibly delighted, and Nate blushed furiously, realizing what he'd said. Sure, it was true, but he hadn't wanted to actually  _admit_ it.

"Let's see you try that." Viggo gave him that cocky, please smile again. "Tell you what. Beat me, and you can." Truth be told, Nate would prefer that to any trophy, but he wasn't about to say it. Conveniently, Viggo then noticed that Griff was, once again, about to meet death. "Damn, does no one want that kid to live through today?" Viggo left once again to talk some sense into Mac. Nate watched him go, and ran into a pole for his efforts.

"Are you okay, Nate-kun?" Kaori asked, coming over. Nate frowned.

"Yeah… I just didn't… see it."

"You and Viggo get along really interestingly" Kaori commented.

"He started it" Nate insisted. The others had already left them behind, going into the station, so they hurried to join them.

………

Nate came in second, which, he decided, wasn't so bad. Pretty impressive, when he considered how distracted he'd been. Viggo was across the clearing, having come in third, talking to Mac. Griff was cowering behind Viggo.

"-you know, you  _could_ share, it certainly wouldn't kill you" Viggo was saying to Mac, earning himself a murderous look. Eventually, Viggo wandered away, probably giving up rather than succeeding.

"Nice race" he said to Nate as he passed him, "looks like you beat me." He was waiting, Nate could tell, to see what Nate would do. Nate knew exactly what would lead to what. He just wasn't sure which he wanted. An interruption saved him from having to reply; at that moment, Psymon came crashing in from the trees, and, racing by, knocked Viggo off his feet. Psymon slowed to a stop only inches from the fence surrounding the end circle.

"You okay?" Nate went over to Viggo, offering a hand to help him up.

"Yeah. I was kind of wondering when he'd turn up" Viggo took Nate's hand and got to his feet. He let go of his hand a moment later than was expected, though. He was motionless for a second, and Nate couldn't understand quite what he was up to, but then it was over and Viggo had sauntered away, probably to brag to Allegra about beating her. Nate remained where he was, head rushing, trying to piece together what had happened, what was the subtext of it, and when he should have done.

"You coming?" Griff's voice penetrated his haze of bewilderment. Griff waved him over towards the gondola station, and Nate followed.

He should have expected that he'd end up near Viggo. Viggo was standing next to Mac, pointing down at something on the mountain as they passed over it. Nate wasn't listening, he was sitting with his head in his hands, completely thrown off track by that time- what, two seconds, really?- he'd spent with Viggo. Then, Mac must have elbowed Viggo or something, and miscalculated the amount of force he'd put into it, because Viggo fell, landing before Nate.

"You just can't stay standing today, can you?" Nate offered a hand without even thinking, and Viggo grabbed it to stand.

"Guess I shouldn't be trusted to stand up here, but unfortunately, all the seats are taken." For two seconds, his gaze lingered over Nate's lap, as if almost, almost asking to sit there, but then he was across the gondola, chatting with Kaori as if he'd never said- or, rather,  _not_ said- something so suggestive. He wandered a few feet closer, to sit on the floor next to Mac, just to bug him.  _Is he really coming on to me that much?_ Nate wondered,  _I hope he's-_ but he couldn't finish the thought, couldn't decide if he hoped Viggo wasn't, or…

It was almost like Viggo knew what he was thinking, because he shot a look over his shoulder at Nate. _He's such a flirt,_ Nate found himself thinking, seeing that same look on Viggo's face. Viggo bit at the air to tease him.

"Bite me, bite me" Nate taunted in a whisper, half horrified he'd given in, half proud, all-around stunned. Viggo smiled.

"Oh, I will." Nate looked down quickly, blushing furiously.

"What?" Elise broke into their silence. Nate looked up at her quickly. The tall blonde was standing before him, one hand on the pole to steady herself.

"Nothing" Nate said, so innocent-sounding and yet so impossible to believe, she laughed. The gondola arrived back at the station. As Nate was walking by the two sitting on the floor, Viggo reached up, grabbing Nate's wrist and pulling himself to his feet.

"Hey, Nate" Zoe said, calling Nate's attention to herself before Nate could even think of what to say to Viggo, "exactly how dense are you?"

"What?" Nate asked. Zpe just shook her head, snickering. If Nate hadn't noticed, well, she didn't want to be the one to share the fact that Elise seemed to have a thing for Nate.

"Nothing." Zoe dismissed it quickly, heading for the exit of the gondola station, smirking.

"It is so not nothing, Moby-" Nate started to argue, but was cut off when he ran into the door Zoe closed in his face.

"Who's clumsy now?" Viggo asked, breezing by. He saw the blush on Nate's face, the way he almost ran into the door a second time when he heard Viggo's voice.  _What is it about you,_ Viggo wondered silently,  _you're beautiful._

…………………..

"Hi" Zoe dropped onto the couch next to Viggo, taking away the TV remote and changing the channel.

"I was watching something…" Viggo protested, but already knew it to be a lost cause. He had claimed his favorite spot on the couch- the part where it turned to make that L shape- and was sprawled across there. His legs were slung over the back of the couch and he lay on his back, glaring up at Zoe.

"Were you now? Interesting." Zoe ran through twenty more channels in a few seconds. "And speaking of interesting…" she grinned, looking around quickly, and going on in a whisper, "so was yesterday."

"How so?" Viggo asked innocently. He already knew she'd seen, though. Zoe always seemed to know everything. He'd found her to be a good confidant, if not a close friend. He hadn't quite figured out how that worked, but didn't particularly care.

"Oh, I don't know…" she examined the ends of her now-purple-streaked hair thoughtfully, "maybe because you were  _so_ hitting on Nate."

"Was I?" Viggo was genuinely surprised. He'd just been playing around. "Good…"

"Good luck with that" Zoe continued flipping through channels.

"How come?"

"You've got to get him away from Elise, it looks like." Viggo groaned at that.

"She's like, a model."

"Good observation." Zoe said dryly. "And if we're playing point-out-the-obvious, she's also a girl. I win."

"Damn, she's a girl!" Viggo put his hands over his face, moaning. "a girl… uggghhkk…"

"Tell me you  _noticed_ …"  
"I- auuggghh, I've got  _no_ chance. None at all. Thanks for wrecking my day, Zoe, I really appreciate it."

"No problem, it was my pleasure." Zoe said calmly, finally stopping the channels on a movie.

"I hate this movie" Viggo contributed.

"So? Go do something else, then. Why don't you go play a video game with Griff or something?" Then she shot a sly look at him and grinned. "Or you could go play with Nate…"

"Very funny. No, he's off somewhere. Him, Mac and Moby, I think, they were playing cards or something. Betting and all."

"Why don't you go join them?"

"Because it was boring." Viggo yawned. "Not like this isn't…"

"Mm. I love this part…" Viggo ignored her. He fell asleep a few minutes later. Zoe heard footsteps at the stairs and turned to see Moby, Nate and Mac. Moby motioned for her to be quiet, and snuck over as Nate and Mac hissed at each other in whispers, arguing.

"The permanent marker bet" Moby whispered to Zoe, grinning. She almost laughed out loud. It was Moby's favorite thing to make someone gamble.

"Who?" she whispered.

"Nate."

"To?"

"Who do you think?" Moby grinned, a decent amount of smugness on his face, "Viggo." They watched as Nate crept over to Viggo, who was fast asleep, and gently pull Viggo's shirt up to expose his stomach. Nate, glancing at Viggo's face every few seconds, quickly scrawled out the words on Viggo's skin.

"What's it say?" Zoe asked.

"It says 'I wish I was as cool as Nate'" Moby snickered, delighted. "See you later" the three ran back upstairs.

"Interesting" Zoe rolled her eyes, going back to her movie. Viggo stirred half an hour later.

"This is still on?" He asked, seeing the movie.

"Yup. So, do you sleep through anything, or what?"

"How so?" Viggo questioned. Zoe reached over and yanked up his shirt. "'I wish I was as cool as Nate'. Entertaining." Viggo grinned, tracing his fingertips over the letters.

"You needed be so obviously infatuated with him" Zoe remarked, rolling her eyes.

"Who says I'm infatuated?" Viggo said, sticking his tongue out at her, the picture of maturity.

"No one needs to say it, Swede, they can just read it. It's already written all over your face." Before Viggo could reply, however, there was a sudden _crash_ from somewhere.

"YYEEEOOOWWW!" Moby shouted. "GODDAMN IT, PSYMON!" There was wild, hysterical laughter, typical of Psymon, and running footsteps on the floors above. Moby appeared at the foot of the stairs a few minutes later, clearly steaming.

"What happened?" Zoe asked as he stomped through the room.

"Psymon put a bunch of furniture against my door, and when I opened it, it all fell on me!" He groaned. "I swear, I'm going to revenge him for this."

The door to the lodge living room opened, and Kaori, Allegra and Elise came inside, carrying shopping bags and looking pleased.

"How was shopping?" Zoe asked, sarcasm in her voice.

"Wonderful!" Kaori didn't seem to notice that Zoe didn't actually care. "We found a great restaurant, too, we're all going tonight!" She ran off to round up the other riders to go to the restaurant. "We'll have dinner real early, so we can go shopping afterwards!"

Viggo wasn't a big fan of Mexican food. He half-listened to the conversation between Kaori, seated on his left, and Mac, across from Kaori, next to Griff. Viggo was sulking because it was pretty much the little kids' table, which he wasn't happy about being included in.  _Sure, Kaori and Mac are, what, nineteen? And Griff's- he's freakin twelve! Stupid kid's table. And the_

 _adults, ooh, cuz they're just sooo cool, get their own table. They're not even that much older. Psymon and Allegra are, like, twenty-eight? And Zoe's like, twenty-four, and Moby's probably that, right? And Elise is twenty-six. And- hey! Nate's just twenty-one! Jerk! I'm twenty-one too! Why am I not over there?! I don't deserve to be at the kid's table…_ Of course, it hadn't actually been deemed the 'kid's table' by anyone but Viggo, or anywhere but in his mind. It was just that there had been a six person table, and a four person table, and he and his three companions had been last in the door. Viggo's gaze drifted from their table to the other one. Psymon and Allegra were immersed in their own conversation, the contents of which Viggo was sure would fairly terrify him. The others were discussing something else, fairly exuberantly. Nate, Viggo noticed, wasn't so into it, he was sitting by the window, sort of watching them, one finger tracing around the mouth of his glass idly. Viggo bit the pineapple slice from his own drink, wondering when they'd get around to leaving. He was exhausted- sleeping had proved to be a challenge, his thoughts just wouldn't shut up- and he'd woken up early, because Nate's alarm clock had gone off. It wasn't the alarm that had woken him so much, though, as the fierce beating it had received afterwards. Nate had apologized profusely, but Viggo had just laughed and watched him fix it. It was only seven in the evening, and Viggo felt quite pathetic to be tired so early in the evening.

"We're going" Viggo looked up, to see Elise breezing by their table. The others followed her, out to the dark parking lot, where everyone started bickering about who went in what car.

"We got dibs on the convertible" Psymon insisted, referring to himself and Allegra. No one wanted to challenge him.

"It's so my turn to drive the little car" Moby broke in before anyone else could interrupt. They were grouped in the corner of the lot, arguing.

"I'm coming" Zoe volunteered.

"I'm driving the SUV, but me and Kaori wanted to stop by a store." Elise warned.

"Oh, yes! We found the best shop ever-" Kaori started to babble.

"I want to go back" Griff put in.

"You can come with us" Moby offered, helpful for once.

"I so wanna see the SUV." Mac decided, taking the keys from Elise's hand and starting off. Viggo, yawning, followed him, with a backward glance at the others. Elise and Kaori were discussing something about directions, and the others were deciding which car they wanted. Mac opened the car door, and while he messed with the CD player, Viggo curled up in the seat by the window.

"You think they'd have a better variety of CDs in here" Mac muttered, finally deciding on a song and settling back into the other window seat.

"Uh-huh…" Viggo mumbled. "Are they coming yet?" He was starting to shiver from the cold air from the open car door.

"Okay!" Elise's voice rattled his thoughts. "We know where we're going."

"This is going to be fantastic" Kaori hopped into the front seat. Viggo felt someone slide onto the seat next to his and assumed Mac had just scooted over.

"The city is so pretty at night" Elise was saying. Nate watched Kaori press buttons on the CD player, which was met with complaint from Mac. Nate figured he was in for about three hours of just waiting for the girls to finish shopping, but… but, Viggo was next to him. Which made it far more worthwhile. The fact that he was such a deciding factor sort of freaked Nate out a little, but he'd decided he'd rather just go with it instead of try and fight it.

A few minutes later, they'd arrived at a store deeper in the heart of the city's downtown. "You guys can just wait here" Elise said, flashing a smile back at them, before she and Kaori bolted from the car, towards the department store.

"Yeah, no problem" Mac sighed. "I didn't know they'd be going shopping first…"

Nate wasn't complaining, though. Viggo had since fallen asleep on his shoulder, and Nate wouldn't have moved for anything. His breath was warm on Nate's neck, and at such close proximity, his cologne alone was enough to be the most sexy turn-on Nate had ever experienced, let alone the fact that Viggo was  _right there._ Nate practically died.

Mac, of course, effectively shattered his moment.

"Dude… can I honk the horn and scare those girls to death?"

"No." Nate replied.

"Then can I jump out of the window and be like, bleeaaagghhh?"

"No."

"The sunroof?"

"No."

"I could start the car-"

"No."

"jump out from under it?"  
"No."

"Aw, man." Mac slouched down in his seat. "You're no fun."

"Sorry."

Viggo woke to cold air in his face, but was against something warm. He

nearly gasped aloud when he saw where he was- Nate's arms. Viggo realized that he must have fallen asleep in the car- and Nate was carrying him into the lodge. Viggo didn't want to end that moment, so he pretended to still be asleep.

"You're so funny" Kaori giggled.

"He fell asleep" Viggo heard Nate explain softly. "Could you open the door for me?"

"Yeah, sure" the door was opened. "He's so cute" Kaori cooed. "He should have gone in the other car if he was going to just fall asleep!"

"Nnn." Viggo couldn't tell if this was meant to be confirmation or disagreement. He didn't hear any more voices until Nate had laid him down on his own bed, but didn't move away quite yet. "She's right about you" Nate half sighed, leaving Viggo to wonder which statement Nate was referring to. He wasn't quite sure, but at the moment, he had one thought he could anchor his world to. Sure, later, he'd want to know more but for the moment, slipping back into sleep to the lullaby of Nate's breathing from the other bed, Viggo had one thought to calm him, and for now, it was all he needed.

He was falling hard for Nate, and he didn't mind at all.


	6. She Could Save Him... And Destroy Him: Now

  _Beep. Beep. Beep._ Nate groaned, reaching for his alarm clock from under the blankets.  _Beep. Beep. Be-cccssshhkk._ The alarm clock smashed into the ground. Satisfied with having put to death the thing that had woken him up so cruelly, Nate sat up slowly, looking around for Viggo. Just as he'd thought. Viggo must have spent the night somewhere else… again. For the fifth night in a row. The thought was less than encouraging. Nate got dressed, pulling on a jacket when he noticed that it was still snowy outside- he wondered where his thoughts were, if he actually had to see if it was _snowing_ when he was on a  _snowboard_ tour- and trudged downstairs to the kitchen. Only some of the riders were there. Elise was making herself coffee, Psymon was eating the sort of waffles that were frozen and then microwaved, and Allegra was staring intently at his food until he noticed and in a very un-Psymon-y way, offered her some. The window of the kitchen was next to the table, and sitting on the window seat was Griff, watching Mac play his game. Mac kept inching away. And Viggo was sitting at the end of the windowseat, looking out the window and seeming unaware that anyone else was in the kitchen at all.

"Hey, cowboy" Elise noticed him first. "Please tell me you didn't break anything this morning." He made a face at the mention, shrugging off his jacket. Yet again, someone had turned up the heater in the kitchen.

"Does  _everyone_ know that story?" She nodded cheerfully. The story of when Nate had thrown his alarm clock across the room and broken a lamp seemed to have become legendary. "Well, no. I didn't." He couldn't help his disagreeable mood. Elise was still looking at him in that questioning way. "What?" He pulled out one of the stools at the counter and sat, not wanting to go near the table.

"Oh, nothing…" Elise murmured, looking down into her coffee cup. She wouldn't say it, but she was thinking about what Nate had said to her a few days previously. Her gaze slid over to Viggo, who was practically sulking.

"Liar" Nate mumbled, but not loud enough for anyone else to hear.

"What?" she looked up.

"Nothi-" he started to say, but then snickering interrupted him. He looked up to see Moby, walking into the kitchen, smirking about something.

"Hey" Moby took the stool next to him, still grinning.

"What's so entertaining?" Nate wondered if he would find anything decent for breakfast in the refrigerator, and decided that he most likely wouldn't.

"Wouldn't you like to know." Moby seemed incredibly entertained by something, in fact. Nate glowered at him.

" _Yeah,_ I  _would,_ that's why I'm  _asking."_ Moby glanced back at the others, seated around the table. They hadn't noticed anything.

"I just found out something" Moby said, soft enough that Elise wouldn't hear him. Nate held up a hand-  _what?_ Moby grinned. "Elise thinks you're hot." He mouthed.

"What?!" Nate practically yelled. All eyes turned to him, and he blushed darkly.

"Something the matter?" Elise questioned. Nate shook his head no, looking away. Moby snickered.

"C'mon, I'll explain" He grabbed Nate by the elbow and dragged him out the door.

Viggo had a view of the porch outside the window, which was where Nate and Moby were now standing. Nate had his back to the window, and Moby was sitting on the porch railing, looking highly amused about something Nate probably didn't find very amusing at all. Viggo found that, leaning closer to the window, he could just hear what they were saying.

"-so, you gonna ask her out on a date or something?" Moby was asking. Nate shook his head no.

"I don't think I like her like that." Viggo picked up on the uncertainty there, wondered what it meant.

"Mate, everyone likes Elise, she's practically a supermodel."

"That right?" Nate shrugged a shoulder. Viggo watched his movements with something between lust and longing. Nate crossed his bare arms over his chest as the wind picked up, probably wishing he'd worn his jacket. "Can I go back inside now? It's freezing."

"Just a sec. How do you not like Elise, mate? I'm gonna have to kill you if you don't take this chance, do you know how many blokes would kill for this?" Moby laughed. "What, you like someone else?" Nate didn't reply. "Well?"

"Figure it out, Moby." Nate snapped, turning and starting away.

"Why don't you just tell me?" Moby asked hopefully.

"Maybe because I've got no idea, either, okay? Leave me alone." Viggo heard the door to the lodge slam, and a few seconds later, Nate appeared back in the kitchen, flushed from the cold and looking distracted.

"What was all that about?" Elise asked as he took his place back at the counter. Nate just shook his head, saying nothing.

"Viggggoooo" Griff whined, poking him. "Make Mac share."

"Griff, I've got an easier time teaching him to fly." Eventually, most of the people left the room; ten minutes later, only Viggo, Elise and Kaori were left. Viggo snuggled deeper into his warm jacket, hardly paying attention to them. One of his favorite things about the winter was how warm it was inside the lodge.

"-I heard the most interesting rumor from Moby-kun, and I was wondering if it is true?" Kaori was saying to Elise. Kaori was making tea, as she did every single morning. Viggo ‑­

wondered if there was something in the teapot or coffee maker that made everyone so addicted to their drink of choice.

"What's the rumor?" Elise asked, only half-interested. Kaori brought her cup of tea to the table, taking the chair next to Elise. She fiddled with one of her pigtails, hesitating.

"I heard that you like Nate-kun" Kaori whispered timidly. Elise didn't say anything for a long moment. Viggo watched her curiously, hoping desperately that it wasn't true.

"I find him to be…" Elise paused to find the right word.  _No, no,_ Viggo thought,  _she can't have him, he's-_  "admittedly attractive."

"oooh!" Kaori squealed, "you would be such a cute couple!" All Viggo's hopes died violent deaths in that very instant.

"Hmm. How'd Moby find out, anyways?"

"I do not know, but he knows." Kaori sipped her tea. Then she seemed to remember something and a look of reluctance crossed her petite features. "And he told Nate-kun."

"That's it." Elise stood up suddenly, looking enraged. "I'm going to kill him."

"Nate-kun or Moby-kun?" Kaori asked worriedly.

Let's go with whoever I find first." Elise said, looking around. Moby walked by the window. "MOBY!" she stalked out the door. Kaori looked nervous, realizing that she'd triggered Elise's wrath, even if it wasn't directed at her.

Moby must have figured out that Elise was looking for him, because he was nowhere to be found. But, as all the bedroom doors had mysteriously disappeared again, it wasn't too hard to go on a very thorough hunt for him. The first room was that of Griff and Mac. Elise strode inside, and looked around the room.

"Yo, you ever heard of knocking?" Mac asked. He was lying on the floor, looking from his game to the game's guide book, open next to him. Griff was bouncing on the bed, trying to see the screen. Mac was doing his best to obstruct the screen from Griff's view.

"There's no door to knock on." Elise replied, looking into the closet and bathroom to make sure Moby wasn't hiding there.

"yeah… still." Mac grumbled. "Goddammit, Griff, if you don't get away from me, I'm going to murder you!"

Elise moved on; she didn't really fancy becoming a witness to a murder. Not unless it was Moby's, anyways. Moby wasn't in hers and Kaori's room, either. There was nothing out of the ordinary in Moby and Psymon's room- except a pile of door hinges and screws. But for Psymon, well, that kind of was normal.

"Hey" Elise arrived at Zoe and Allegra's room. Only Zoe was there, and she was watching TV, lying on her stomach on the bed and painting her nails metallic silver.

"Hi. What's up?"

"Since when do you paint your nails?" Elise asked, pausing in her tour through the room.

"Since Moby got me this" Zoe held up the small bottle of nail polish. "Thought I'd try it out." she shrugged a shoulder. "But I swear, if anyone else gives me nail polish- it's going down ‑­

their throat!" Elise didn't doubt it, but nonetheless made a mental note to give Zoe a box full of nail polish and the like for her birthday.

"Yeah, speaking of Moby, do you know where he is?" Elise peeked into the closet, and under the beds.

"Nope, sorry." Zoe blew on her nails to dry them. "Do I really have to wait five minutes for them to dry? That's so  _long…_ "

"Yup, sometimes longer. See you."

"Auughkk… five minutes…" Elise left the room. She stopped at the door to Nate and Viggo's room, taking a breath before approaching. Only Nate was there, unsurprisingly. He was lying on his bed, throwing a tennis ball at the wall. Elise stood there, just watching him. The ball hit the wall, just above the bed. Again, and again.

"Hey" she said. The ball suddenly changed course and slammed into the alarm clock as Nate jerked towards her voice.

"Hi- oh, shit, not the clock  _again_ \- sorry, hi." He was flustered, sitting up and looking between her and the alarm clock that lay on the floor. It was in pieces, as the glue he'd used to fix it before had fallen apart. "um…" he decided to address the clock, slipping off the bed and scooping it up. Elise wondered just how much he knew about her.

"I was just wondering if you'd seen Moby."

"Nope" He replied, looking up from the pieces he was holding. "Haven't since, ah… breakfast."

"Mm. Okay." She left hurriedly before she said something stupid, continuing her search outside. She heard voices up on the roof and shielded her eyes to see. Psymon and Allegra were up there, with rope, doing something. With the doors. Elise sighed.

"You guys seen Moby?" She yelled up.

"Who?" Allegra asked vaguely, not even looking down at her. Elise rolled her eyes. Allegra was so smitten with her boyfriend- that news had made Elise gag- she didn't even remember who Moby was. From what Elise had heard, Psymon had asked her out sometime when they were out practicing together. Quite romantic,  _Psychos stick together, I guess,_ Elise thought, walking away. She saw that one of the rental cars was gone, meaning that Moby had hightailed it out, probably wouldn't come back until midnight.

Nate meanwhile, had fallen back onto the bed to resume throwing the tennis ball after Elise had left. He didn't need her to complicate his thoughts even more. He had enough going on with Viggo, and suddenly Elise had been paying attention to him.

The ball hit the wall a few more times.

But maybe it was a good thing.

Maybe it could help him. Maybe that was it. She would balance out his life.

The ball hit the wall again, and he carefully angled it away from the alarm clock this time. Again and again. Then a thought hit him.

_She could save him._

Spending time with her would give him something to hang onto. He didn't  _like_ all this uncertainty, feeling like that there was always something wrong, having to hide this newly discovered factor of himself, and he just wanted it to  _go away._ He didn't  _want_ to be so wild about Viggo, he didn't  _want_ to keep finding more about him to fall in love with, he didn't  _want_ to have to  _deal_ with all of this complicated stuff. He wanted something he could count on, something he knew, he wanted something easy to deal with, that wouldn't be met with such conflict, both from everyone else and himself. And Elise, she could give him something resembling his former life, his life before Viggo. Damn, that guy had a way of turning things upside-down. From the second he'd seen Viggo, Nate should have known, and in his thoughts, going back over that moment, he could almost hear, as his world shattered, the sound of-

_CRASH._

Nate jumped up, wondering if his imagination had suddenly come to life, or if maybe he was just going insane, but he could have  _sworn_ that he'd heard a distinct crashing noise. Kind of like a window shattering.

"PSYMON! DAMMIT, YOU PSYCHOPATH!" He heard Zoe's screaming. No, the window really had broken. Maybe Psymon had broken it? It was pretty likely. Nate went downstairs, curiosity compelling him to go see. True enough, the big window in the living room was broken, and Zoe was on one side, screaming at Psymon, who was on the other.

"What happened?" Nate asked Elise. She shrugged a shoulder.

"Psymon did something or other, so Zoe threw him through the window."

"Oh. Okay." He wasn't shaken by the news; no one was, really.

"Dude, what happened here?" Viggo's voice made Nate look towards the doorway, where Viggo was now standing.

"I'm going to go practice a bit" Elise said, drawing Nate's attention away from Viggo, "Want to come?" Nate glanced from her, back to Viggo, then nodded. Elise didn't notice that his eyes were on the other blonde, not her, as if some sort of gravitational pull of Viggo's had a secure lock on Nate's attention.

"Sure. I'll go grab my board."

Ten minutes later, the lodge was strangely silent. Allegra walked through the living room, glass crunching under her boots. Someone had swept most of it up, but the evidence was still all there- the window had a huge hole in it, for one.

"Psymon?" She called out. He'd vanished off after Zoe had thrown him through the window because he'd laughed at her nail polish. To the others, Psymon's momentary disappearance was a mixed bag of emotions- relieved at having peace, and worried about when he would turn up. Allegra, however, was drawn to his confidence and spontaneity, and felt honored that he would ask her to participate in all the stuff he did- and it was so much  _fun,_ too. She'd gotten to know him, and once she'd gotten past the eccentricity, she'd found out that he was considerate and fiercely protective. The discoveries pleased her to no end. "Psyyymonnn…" she heard a car pull up in front of the lodge and ran to go see. Psymon was just getting out, carrying a shopping bag from the hardware store.

"Hey, sweet thing" he greeted her enthusiastically. "Want to help me pay back Zoe?"

"Sure!" Psymon's plan turned out to include lots of brackets, tape, and tools, but she didn't know exactly what he was planning to do. He set the bag on the porch and went back for the others.

"Would you call Moby for me and ask him to go out with Zoe tonight?" Psymon asked.

"Yeah, sure" She dialed Moby's cell number. He agreed without hesitation, if a tad bit of suspicion, and said they'd leave in half an hour.

Once Zoe and Moby had gone, Allegra helped Psymon take all the stuff from the hardware store up to Zoe and Allegra's room. As the doors were still strapped to the chimney, there wouldn't have been much of a problem getting in even if the room wasn't half Allegra's.

"What're you going to do?" She asked curiously. Psymon grinned.

"All this furniture" he swept out an arm to indicate the stuff in the room, "is going to be bolted to the ceiling"

"Awesome!" Allegra exclaimed. Then she paused. "Wait. Where will  _I_ sleep?" This earned herself another smile.

"You could always bunk with Elise and Kaori, or, I dunno… in my room. I can kick out Moby."

"Ooh, sounds awesome!" Allegra started sorting through the stuff in the bags. "So, how're you doing this…?"

"You'll see." He walked towards the desk, screwdriver in hand. "Hand me that bracket you've got."

After a movie and dinner with Moby, Zoe was convinced that nothing could go wrong. She'd been impressed with how perfect it had been.  _This is the only guy I'd wear nail polish for,_ she thought, glancing over at him; he was driving, and drumming his fingers on the steering wheel,  _wow._

But not ten minutes later, standing in the doorway of her and Allegra's bedroom, she had to come out of her heavenly haze. The room seemed strangely empty. There was no furniture.

"Where's all the- eaaaaggghhh!" Every single piece of furniture was somehow fixed to the ceiling above her head. The nightstand, the desk, the chair, even the  _bed._ All that was left were the blankets off the bed. Even the TV had been bolted to the ceiling, who  _knew_ how. "Oh… my… god…"

Meanwhile, down the hallway, Psymon was standing in front of the door to his and Moby's room- the only room that had a door now, unsurprisingly- blocking Moby's entrance.

"Mate, we're sharing the room! You've got to let me in!" Moby insisted. Psymon crossed his arms over his chest.

"Find somewhere else to sleep, Brit. Maybe you can bunk with your girl Zoe… if you don't mind not having a bed, that is." He grinned, and went into the room, slamming the door in Moby's face.

"Now that he's gone…" he said, turning back to Allegra, who was lying on the bed. She grinned, looking like a lioness that had caught her prey after a long, hard chase.

"Impress me."

Moby was stalking down the hallway, deciding what to do next.

"No  _way…"_ he heard Zoe's voice.

"What's up?" Moby poked his head through the doorway to her room. "Woww… How'd all the furniture get up there?" She gave him a look. "Psymon, probably Allegra, too. Figures…"

Viggo stopped in the doorway to his and Nate's room, debating. Nate didn't know he was there, if he had, he probably would have been at a loss for words. He was standing at the window, looking out at the mountain. Viggo's gaze wandered through the room, remembering that brief argument that had began the standoff. He supposed that, maybe, just maybe, he'd overreacted. But… not really. The more he thought about it, the more it hurt him. That tone, that look, it just  _killed_ him. And that it had been on the very day he'd decided to tell Nate just how much he liked him. Not two hours previous to it, he'd made his decision- risks be damned, he was going to tell Nate that he really, really liked him.

He just wanted more time to think about it. He wasn't ready to deal yet... but now with Elise liking Nate too, it was like all the stakes were higher, and all the world's eyes were upon them, waiting for the next move.

_She could destory him._

The thought came unbidden. Elise could take away everything Viggo wanted, steal the one guy he knew he loved. Viggo glanced at Nate once more, momentarily breathless from the silhouette of who he knew, just  _knew_ was some sort of soulmate... and then decided he wasn't ready to talk yet and continued down the hall to Mac and Griff's room, so he could hide from his problems for at least one more night.

 

 


	7. Everything Revolves Around Her: Now

Viggo was sulking. And if his bad mood wasn't enough to tick him off, pretty much everyone else at the lodge was so damn  _happy_ right now. While he sulked in his favorite place in the kitchen, already ready for the race, the lodge was this place of total happiness while everyone ran around getting ready or just waited for the others to be. Elise came into the kitchen, humming happily, and made herself coffee.

"What're you so happy about?" Viggo asked. She gave him a brilliant smile, and he hoped to hell  _and_ heaven that it didn't have anything to do with Nate.

"I'm getting my new car today!" She exclaimed. Viggo breathed an inward sigh of relief. "It's this gorgeous little convertible… midnight blue… so romantic…"

"Who's romantic and blue?" Zoe came into the kitchen next. Even she was in an unusually great mood, probably due to Moby.

"My car" Elise sang out. "I get it today!"

"That's nice." Zoe opened the refrigerator, completely apathetic.

"Have you seen Moby around?" Elise asked her. Zoe looked over her shoulder at Elise.

"What do you want with him?"

"Nothing much. I just want to kill him, that's all. Have you seen him?"

"Nope" Zoe lied obviously, leaving the kitchen. Viggo saw Psymon and Allegra run by on the porch, looking happy about something; Psymon had a bottle of superglue in his hand, a frightening concept. Viggo continued to sulk when he saw that even Griff and Mac were cheerful; Mac had beaten a level in his game, and Griff had been allowed to read the guide book for the game under careful supervision.  _There is_ ** _nothing_** _more annoying then everyone being in a good mood when I'm not!_ Viggo thought angrily. Ten minutes later, Nate came into the kitchen. He avoided the table, sitting at the counter island instead. Viggo felt a small twinge of happiness when he saw that at least Nate wasn't all happy-cheerful this morning.

"What's up with you?" Elise asked. Nate put his head on his folded arms atop the counter.

"Do you know what Allegra and Psymon did to me this morning?"

"What?" Elise poured herself a cup of coffee, stirring in cream.

"Superglued my alarm clock to the ceiling so I couldn't shut it off easily" Nate growled. Elise arched an eyebrow.

"Easily? You mean, you turned it off?"

"Yeah." Nate said.

"How?"

"Um… I kind of… broke it. With a… chair."

"You stabbed it with a chair." Elise clarified.

‑"Sort of." Nate admitted reluctantly.

"That takes strength." Viggo didn't like that small note of admiration in her tone. He took comfort in the fact that its pitch seemed to be something Nate was tone deaf to.

"Except now part of it's stuck to the ceiling and the rest is in pieces" Elise laughed, but when she realized that Nate was dead silent, stopped.

"Where is Psymon? I want my door back."

"Join the club. I want my door back too. And my pillow. And my damn gloves, too, I'm  _positive_ he stole them!"

……………

"Uh…" Psymon was looking over the roof edge, a little stunned.

"What is it?" Allegra asked.

"I thought Elise's new car was, like, far away?" She'd brought it back to the lodge after the race that day.

"Yeah, it is."

"It's not anymore…" Allegra went to see what he was talking about.

"Oh my god." They'd gone to get back the doors, because Elise had threatened dismemberment and then death if she didn't get her door back soon. And Psymon had just thrown the doors down from the roof, and they'd landed in the spot where they were meant to land- but now, there was a convertible where there had, only moments before, been only empty snow.

"Who moved the car?!" Psymon roared.

"Moby and Mac were sneaking around this morning" Allegra recalled, twisting the end of one of her braids around her finger. "I bet it was them…"

"Moby! Mac!" Moby and Mac appeared on the other side of the lodge, down on the porch.

"You rang?" Moby asked sarcastically.

"You dolts!" Psymon yelled. "You touched Elise's car, didn't you?" Both looked scared.

"Uh… well, we, uh…" Mac stammered.

"We just went really quick, just to see how it drove!" Moby held out his hands. "That's it!"

"We're innocent!" Mac wailed.

"Yeah? Go take a look at that shiny new convertible" was all Psymon said.

There was a pause as the two ran around the side of the lodge.

"EEEAAAUUUUGGGGHHHHHHHH!!"

"Elise is going to kill me twice now!" Moby screamed.

"Dude, she's going to kill us, and then bring us back to life, make us do a race wearing nothing but boxers, and then kill us again, then bring us back to life, and burn our snowboards in front of his, then maim us, then-" Mac was frantic, staring wide-eyed at the car.

‑­"You'd better keep her from seeing it" Psymon called down.

"Oh, we will" Moby said, backing away from the car. "Oh, noo…"

…………………….

"Elise!" Mac screamed out, just as Elise went to open the door of the kitchen. She turned. Mac had been in the kitchen since four that afternoon, while Moby kept guard on the other door out, in the living room.

"What?"

"I- uh- I really like your jacket."

"Um… thank you." She looked back to the door. Moby heard her voice, and ran into the room to help.

"And also! I, ah, um, your shoelace is untied." Elise looked down at her shoe, then back up at Mac.

"No it's not… I don't have laces."

"Oh, right, my bad." Mac said. Elise tried to leave again. Mac gestured frantically to Moby to stop her.

"EEEEAAAUUUGGGHHH!" Moby screamed suddenly, starting to half run, half dance or something, around in circles. "SPIDER! SPIDER! SPIDER!"

"I don't  _care_ , Moby."

"Right, right… want coffee?" Moby asked, recovering immediately.

"I just had some, actually." She indicated the cup she'd recently set down.

"I'll make you lunch." Mac offered while Moby tried to think of something else.

"That's very nice of you, but I already ate."

"I think that door handle is broken. You don't want to get hurt, better step back from it. Better yet, stay inside. It's safer!"

"It is  _not_ broken." There was a pause.

"Psymon just ran by." Moby warned.

"With a chainsaw!" Mac added. "And he looked…"

"Vengeful!" Moby finished. Elise gave them a confused look.

"He and Allegra went to town. This afternoon. An hour ago."

"Right…" Mac fell silent. Then Moby jumped up.

"EEEAAAUUUUGGGHHHH AVALANCHE! WE'RE ALL GONNA DIIIIIEEEEEE…" he howled, pointing to the window and falling to his knees on the tile, head in his hands.

"For heaven's sake, Moby, there is not an avalanche." Moby got up quickly.

"I know, I was just, uh, practicing. You know, for a real avalanche. But, um, OH MY GOD ELISE YOUR HAIR IS ON FIRE!!"

"No it's not…" she reached up a hand to her ponytail, finding it to be just fine, and looked at the pair like they were both completely crazy… which they were.

"Elise…" Mac said suddenly, as Griff walked into the room, "Griff loves you!"

"No I don't." Griff said, bewildered beyond all reason.

"Moby, he's like, twelve."

"Right. I know that. I was just, uh, testing you. no- joking! I was joking. Ha, ha, joke!" Moby looked from her to Mac, hopelessly. Griff left before they targeted him again.

"You guys are crazy…" he muttered as he left.

"Hey, Elise, uh- Nate wanted to talk to you! Right now!" Mac said suddenly. Elise arched an eyebrow.

"He's out practicing. He left an hour ago."

"I know, he, um, he called! On his phone! Yeah, his phone! He used that to, um… call!" Mac pointed to the phone that was sitting on the desk in the corner of the room. Elise shook her head.

"I would've heard it ring."

"It was on silent." Moby interrupted. "New feature for the phone and all…"

"Well, I'm going up there, so I'll just meet him there." Elise started for the door again.

"No! He said to, um, stay here! And he's- he's-" Mac grabbed for words, and Moby saved him.

"He's going to take you to dinner this evening!" Moby announced grandly.

"Is he really?" Elise asked curiously.

"Of course he is!" Mac said. "He's- uh-"

"In love with you!" Moby blurted out, throwing his hands into the air. Mac stared at him in shock.

"Nate?" Elise asked incredulously. Mac and Moby nodded.

"Madly" Mac confirmed. "Haven't you heard?"

"Well, I'm going to go, I'll meet up with him there."

"NO!" Moby screamed, "I forgot to tell you, that, um, ZOE IS UNCONSCIOUS! She fell! HELP HELP HELP! AAAAAHH HELP HER!"  
"You've been in here all this time and just now remembered?" Elise asked. Zoe walked into the kitchen.

"Hey, you guys."

"Unconscious, huh?" Moby froze for a second.

"ZOE, MY LOVE, YOU'RE ALIVE!" he screamed, throwing his arms around her and sobbing. "It's a miracle! You're alive!" Zoe gave him a bewildered look.

"Um, yeah… Look, I just came inside to get my gloves…" She peeled him off of her and left the room. Moby thought frantically as Elise stepped towards the door again, Mac and him standing motionless, watching her leave, horrified. She turned the door handle.

"AAAAAAHHHH HELP I BROKE MY LEG!" Mac screamed suddenly, making Mob stare at him.

"You haven't even  _moved."_ Elise said. He stopped screaming bloody murder abruptly.

"Right. Just testing. I, um, uh-" he couldn't come up with anything more, and neither could Moby.

"You guys." Elise finally said. "Is there a  _reason_ you don't want me to go outside?"

"Uh…"

"Fine then."  
"Elise, wait." Moby interrupted. "Please. Don't go outside."

"I'll do what I want, Moby."

"Please, please, please, listen!" Mac wailed.

"No! I'm going outside! I just want to go practice, for heaven's sake! All I want to do is go get my snowboard from the back porch, and go practice! Is that so much to ask for?!"

"Uh…" Moby fell silent. Elise opened the door, and they heard her footsteps, then both raced to the door in a last desperate attempt to stop her.

"Oh…. My… god. My  _car!"_ she shrieked. Mac and Moby exchanged looks, then bolted out of the kitchen like death was at their heels.

Which, in the form of Elise... it was.

……………….

In the span of a few short hours, Viggo noticed, the happy moods of the morning were gone, which gave him a dark sort of satisfaction. Moby and Mac were absolutely freaked out about Elise's car, and Griff was pouting because Mac had hidden the game from him.

Moby and Mac were in the living room, hiding behind the armchair.

"What're we going to do?" Mac whispered. "She's going to find us sometime."

"I dunno, mate… but she can't kill us, right? It's against the race rules, right?"

"I hope so…" The front door opened and they crouched down. It was just Nate, though. He set his snowboard against the wall, brushing snow off of him.

"Nate!" Elise's voice made Moby and Mac freeze.

"Hi."

"So… where're we going to dinner?" Elise asked Nate. He stared at her. Viggo, in the kitchen, leaned around the door to watch, horror in his eyes.

"Dinner." Nate said blankly.

"Moby and Mac said you were wanted to ask me out to dinner" Elise reminded him brightly.

"Um… I…" he searched for the right reply. "Yes. Yes, I did."

Moby and Mac exchanged bewildered looks. This was news to them.

"Really?" Elise perked up instantly, looking delighted.

"Yeah. Um… I was thinking, like… eight tonight? I have, um, reservations. At a place. A restaurant. Would you like to go?" Elise beamed.

"That sounds great! Where?"

"Um… I forget the name… but it's… really nice." When she left the room, it was dead silent.

‑"What the hell did you guys get me into?" Nate asked the two. They both gave him helpless smiles.

"You didn't have to say you would." Mac offered helplessly.

"What was I supposed to say, no?! It's Elise! I-"

"you're really in love with her?" Mac asked, wide-eyed.

"You have reservations?" Moby asked at the same time. Nate didn't say anything. In the kitchen, they heard the door slam. The force of it knocked loose the plate that had been hanging on the wall next to it, and it shattered on the ground.

Viggo stopped on the porch. He didn't actually want to go far, but he didn't want to be there.

Nate and Elise.

Viggo sat on the edge of the porch, head in his hands.  _I lost my chance._ From within the kitchen, he heard Nate's voice.

"Hi… I'd like to make a reservation… eight thirty tonight. Yeah, great. Thanks…" the phone was hung up.

"Yo" Mac and Moby came outside. Viggo glowered at them. "You, uh… mad at us for some reason?" Mac ventured.

"Oh…" Moby said as it dawned on him. Mac gave him a questioning look. Moby just stood there before Viggo, looking down at the ground, head hung. "Sorry, mate."

"I don't care." Viggo said icily, standing. "They can do whatever the hell they want. It doesn't affect me at all."

"So you're mad because…?" Mac asked, not getting it. Viggo shook his head.

"Forget it."

"Viggo…" Moby called after him, to no avail. Viggo slammed the door on his way back into the lodge. It didn't help his mood much when he heard Kaori and Elise's voices from their room, Kaori saying how pretty the dress Elise had chosen was. When it came down to it, Viggo felt like everything revolved around  _her._

"I shoulda known" Viggo said under his breath. "I never stood a chance."

 


	8. The Thing That Hurts Him The Most: Now

  _There's nothing that great about him, anyways,_ Viggo thought angrily, standing at the lodge window, watching bitterly as Elise joined Nate at the rental convertible. She was wearing a knee-length midnight blue dress, her blonde hair pulled back. Viggo was unimpressed, bitter, and downright jealous. Jealous, because she was with  _Nate._ Viggo had never seen Nate in anything but casual clothes, and now, he had black pants, a dark grey-button up shirt. Viggo turned away when Elise reached out and fixed Nate's half-turned-down collar.  _Should be me. Should be me. But it can't be, and he doesn't even want it to be._ Viggo threw himself onto his corner of the couch, but this didn't get so much as a glance from Mac or Griff, both of whom were pouring over the that game again.  _I don't care what he does,_ Viggo thought stubbornly,  _he's a jerk. I don't like him, not at all._ His thoughts continued in the same pattern for the next hour.

"Did Elise leave yet?" Moby called out from upstairs.

"Yes" Viggo spat out. Moby appeared behind the couch, concern and something like guilt darkening his face. Viggo pushed his blonde hair out of his eyes, refusing to look at Moby.

"Viggo…" Moby started hesitantly. "If we'd known, we would have-"

"What? Known what?" Viggo sat up, turning to glare at Moby. "I don't care what he does. He can do whatever the hell it is that straight guys do,  _I don't care_." He stalked out of the room. Moby took his place on the couch, sighing heavily.

"He's in denial." He said. Mac glanced up.

"Who's in what?"

"Forget it." Moby sighed again. "I wonder how Nate and Elise's date is going…"

"Why'd he even ask her out?" Mac asked. Moby looked over at him; Mac was sprawled on the floor, absorbed in his game.

"Because we tricked him into it."

"Yo, what? That was soooo your idea."

"Nuh-uh. It was yours, mate."

"Duuude, no! So not my idea!"

"It was too."

"Was not. Dude, I never would have set Nate up with her." Mac said indignantly. "Do you  _know_ what's goin' on?"

"I- kind of, yeah! I do!" Moby insisted. "About how Viggo's pissed off that Nate's a homophobe and how he dated Nate's friend and neither told him!" Mac stared at him, dark eyes full of disbelief.

"Dude. Where'd you hear that?"

"What? Isn't it right?"

"Uh… " Mac returned his attention to his game. "Whatever you say, dude."  _Wonder where he got that story,_ Mac thought, staring intently at the small screen, very aware of Griff hovering nearby, trying to see the screen too and being very unable to do so,  _Viggo's not mad because of any of that._

………………..

The success of the date depended entirely on the party being questioned about it, however.

‑­"How was your date?" Kaori asked when Elise came into their room, at nearly midnight. Elise sat on the edge of the bed to take off her high heels.

"Amazing" She breathed, smiling. "He's such a sweetheart…" Elise had had the time of her life, having been completely oblivious to the fact that the date hadn't been in Nate's plan for the evening prior to her mention of it. She just noticed how cute he was when he wasn't sure what to say, the way his eyes were so dark and deep she felt lost looking in them… Elise was aware that most of her attraction was based on looks. She didn't really mind, though.

Nate's own thoughts, meanwhile, weren't on the same track. Or even a similar track. He noticed that the bedroom door was back just in time to keep from walking into it, and opened it instead.

"How was the date?" Moby's voice made Nate flinch.

"What're  _you_  doing here?" Moby was sitting on Viggo's bed, watching TV. He shrugged a shoulder, glancing at Nate only briefly.

"Locked out of my room again. And I wanted to have a bed, instead of sleeping on the floor again, as much fun as that was. So I figured that since, um, yeah. I'm here." Nate was thankful he hadn't mentioned Viggo, even though Nate was thinking of just that. "So? Date? Success?"

"I dunno. It was okay. Nice…" He didn't offer anything else. Moby decided that it was just because Nate was tired, and let it be, that Nate probably wasn't thinking about it much. Moby was wrong.

Nate was thinking that he'd gone out with the wrong person.

"DAMN YOU PSYMON!!" Zoe's scream shattered the previously silent atmosphere. Moby jumped up to see what had happened and Nate followed along after him out of curiosity. Zoe was standing in the middle of her room's bare floor, the desk that had formerly been attached to the ceiling lying on the floor near her. The bolts that had been keeping it on the ceiling were still up there, but the wood on the ends of the desk legs was split. "He nearly got me killed!" Zoe pointed to the broken desk. "It fell from the ceiling!" Nate wandered back towards his own room, losing interest. He didn't want to be around when the bed fell from the ceiling, either.

……………………..

Nate was surprised he was able to function at all, let alone race decently, but the last stretch of the race found him in fourth place. It was just a practice race, but he felt it was good news for his racing later on. He cut a corner and ended up ahead of Zoe, which earned himself a lot of mumbled curses from her. He could see the finish; Elise had already finished. She was standing next to her board, hands on her hips, not appearing to be tired at all.

"Nate!" Her voice made him look up and swerve accidentally, and he ran into someone.

"Oh, sorry, sorry," He slid across the finish line and hit the ground, unable to even see who he'd hit. It had been Viggo, who'd veered off the course and promptly hit a tree.

"Oww…" he moaned, spitting out snow. He hadn't broken anything, but he was positive he'd find bruises. Across the way, he could see Elise. And Nate.

"Nice race" Elise was saying to Nate, laughing a little, pale blue eyes bright with amusement. Then she did the thing that hurt Viggo the most.

Like it was nothing, she leaned forward and kissed Nate on the cheek.

Viggo stared after her, as she left the clearing, Nate motionless. "Wow…" Nate said softly, just loud enough for Viggo to hear.

Viggo couldn't help it. He just started to cry.

"Dude, Viggo! What happened?" Mac appeared at the entrance to the forest, wide-eyed with shock. "You okay?"

"Fine" Viggo managed to choke out.

"Damn liar. What happened?"

"What?" Nate's voice carried over, and Viggo instantly turned away. Mac knelt down in the snow in front of him, looking from him to Nate. "Damn, I hit you, didn't I? I'm sorry! I'm so, so sorry! Are you okay? I'm sorry…"

"He.. .and Elise…" Viggo murmured so only Mac could hear, wiping away tears hurriedly, blushing darkly. Mac got it.

"I've got him, don't worry, dude" Mac called out to Nate, "You can take off, he'll be fine." Nate had such a tortured look on his face that Mac nearly begged Viggo to give the guy a chance to apologize for whatever it was he'd done, but meddling in the issue, Mac knew, would be useless.

"Oh… okay…" Nate dragged himself away reluctantly.

Once back at the lodge, however, he sought out Mac again. Mac was lying on the floor in the living room in front of the fire, reading the guide book for his video game.

"Hey Mac" Mac practically ignored him.

"Hnnh?"

"How's Viggo?"

"Fine." Mac flipped the page. "…so there's a  _tunnel…"_

"But… he hit a tree."

"He's fine."

"What do you mean, he's fine? He was so-" he trailed off for lack of a better description.

"What makes you think he's not fine?"

"I dunno, maybe because he was fucking sobbing, that might've been what tipped me off" Nate threw his hands up in frustration, and Mac finally put down his magazine to look up at him.

"Okay, okay, sorry, dude. But seriously, he's fine. Totally and absolutely fine. No broken bones, no concussion, no damage. No harm no foul."

"But…"

" _Nate"_ Mac sighed heavily. "I swear to you, Viggo didn't get hurt. Okay?"

"Okay…" Nate left again, but Mac only had a few minutes of uninterrupted reading time before someone else came along to annoy him. This time it was Viggo.

"How pathetic does he think I am, anyways?" Viggo snapped, sitting next to Mac on the floor. He had the sleeves of his green jacket pushed up to his elbows, and Mac could see a bruise on his left arm and a thin cut on his right from his fall.

"Dude… seriously?" Mac lowered the magazine reluctantly so he could stare at Viggo. Viggo pulled his jean-clad knees up to his chest.

"Why else would he keep asking about me? He must think I'm a total wimp. I mean, I've been in way worse, that was nothing!" Mac shook his head, reddish-brown hair falling in his eyes.

"Not even. Man, that's the last time I think someone older than me is supposed to be smart." Viggo glowered at him for that, but he proceeded anyways. "I mean, seriously? What the hell, dude, you're supposed to be, like, smarter than me, aren't you?"

"Want to tell me why?" Viggo said through his teeth, doing his best to hang onto his patience. Mac offered a weak smile.

"My bad. Anyways, ah…" he put his hands behind his head, dragging out the moment just to torment Viggo.

"Mac…" Viggo warned.

"Okay, okay. He's not asking after you cuz he thinks you're pathetic."

"So why else would he?"

"Because he's worried about you, why else? He thinks he hurt you."

"He did!" Viggo stood, pausing for a moment like he was going to say something else, then stalked off.

"Dude, I thought you said he didn't?" Mac called after him, but got no response. "Whatever…" Mac picked up his magazine again.

Viggo resisted the urge to slam the door shut, and just pushed it quietly closed behind him. Most of the other boarders were inside, although he saw Moby run by through the trees across the snow-covered clearing. Zoe followed, snowball in hand.

"-really?" Kaori's squeal came through the open kitchen window. "Ooh, that is wonderful news!"

"You think I should?" Elise's voice came next. Viggo hopped off the porch, into snow that was up to his ankles. There was a strange sound from the roof, like hammering, and Viggo back up into the clearing so he could see what it was. Then he caught sight of the person on the porch, and froze. Nate was leaning against the wall next to the kitchen door, obviously eavesdropping on Elise and Kaori's conversation. Viggo hid behind one of the cars parked before the lodge, and crept closer again.

"-I don't know. Maybe I will" Elise said thoughtfully. Nate looked pained.

"I'm so fucked" He muttered under his breath, pushing himself away from the wall and going back inside the lodge. Viggo debated going to see what was up, but decided against it, and continued his investigation instead. Unsurprisingly, Psymon and Allegra were up on the roof. The roof was decorated with… something, hammered to the shingles. On a second glance, Viggo saw that every pillow in the lodge was now attached to the roof. And besides that…  _what the hell is that?_ Viggo wondered, looking up at the roof in confusion, where Psymon was walking along the top, carrying something while Allegra sat against the chimney, laughing,  _is that a tire?!_ True enough, the rental convertible was missing two tires. Viggo didn't really want to know what had happened to the second one.

Nate had wandered off to resume his game of throw-the-tennis-ball-against-the-wall, thinking of Elise's cold lips against his cheek, the way Viggo had cried, wondering , more than anything, what he could do.

He could force himself to love Elise.

He could allow himself to love Viggo.

Somehow, though, he felt like somehow, he'd already chosen twice. He'd chosen what he truly wanted, and then he'd forced himself to cope with the other choice.

"What'd I even do to him, anyways?" Nate mumbled, throwing the ball at the wall with increasingly more force. "I just…" the ball went off-course and smashed into the alarm clock. "Damn" Nate glared over at the broken pieces. "Why can't I do anything but fuck things up?!" It was the thing that hurt him the most and he had to force himself not to cry.

Nate failed.

 

 


	9. Mac The Day Ruiner: Now

"EEEEEEEEEEEEAAAAAAAAAAAAUUUUUUUUUUUUGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHH!!"

The sudden scream woke up everyone in the lodge. From every single bedroom, profuse cursing and yelling could be heard. Psymon roared for the screamer to shut up, while Elise screamed the same thing; both Nate and Zoe wanted to know what the hell that was, Moby had an artful mix of incomprehensible curses, Viggo just moaned for the screamer to shut up, only Kaori wanted to know what was wrong, and somehow, Allegra slept through the whole thing. Griff just screamed and ran.

"IT'S TWO IN THE DAMN MORNING!" Psymon informed all of them unnecessarily.

"Who the  _hell_ screams at two?!" Moby growled, hurling his pillow across the room and getting out of bed.

"Ow…" Nate hurled it at the back of Moby's head and curled up under the blankets. Grumbling, Moby slammed the door on his way out and went down to the room Mac was sharing with Griff and Viggo. He hammered on the door until it was opened by Viggo, who slipped past him and headed for the stairs to the living room.

"Mac, I want to know what the bloody hell you're doing!" Moby demanded, going up to Mac, who was standing next to his bed and glaring down at him.

"He  _played_ it!" Mac howled, falling to his knees, bent over his handheld game. "And he deleted my gaaaammmeeee…"

"Uh… Mac. It's one AM. NO ONE GIVES A FUCK ABOUT YOUR GAME!" Moby took a deep breath, trying to calm himself. "Who played it?" he asked, forcing himself to be patient.

"GRIFF!" Mac screamed suddenly, leaping to his feet and tearing out of the room. "DAMN YOU GRIFF, GET BACK HERE!" Moby picked up the game Mac had left on the bed and pressed a few buttons.

"Hmm. And he calls himself a genius gamer…" Mac hadn't realized that Griff hadn't actually deleted his game, he'd just started a second one. Mac's saved game had simply dropped farther down on the menu. "Moron…"

The first thing Allegra noticed while she was waiting for the toaster oven to toast her frozen waffle was that everyone was in a bad mood. Elise had come in, gotten coffee, and walked out, probably to go back to her room. Psymon had refused to do anything but sleep for several more ours. Zoe was glaring at her cup of coffee like it was the source of all problems in the universe. Moby was sitting at the table, with a strangely smug yet angry look on his face. Viggo was asleep on the couch, and Allegra had no idea why. Griff was gone, Mac was also nowhere to be seen. Even Kaori was less than cheerful as she made her tea and went back to her room. So it was just Zoe, Moby, and Allegra in the kitchen, and Allegra got a glare from both when she started humming, and stopped quickly.

The second thing she noticed was that when Nate crossed the living room towards the kitchen, he went to great lengths to avoid where Viggo was sleeping.

"Why're you avoiding him?" she asked conversationally. "He sleeps like the dead. Besides, how could he get mad at you? He's sleeping where people normally walk through." Nate gave her an uncharacteristically hostile look.

"Fuck you sincerely." He downright snarled, and slammed the kitchen door, hard, when he left.

"Woah" Allegra arched an eyebrow, watching the door to see if it would shatter from the impact. "What's up with  _him?_ And everyone else, for that matter?" The toaster oven's timer dinged. "Ooh, waffles!"

"Did you really sleep through all that this morning at two?" Moby asked.

"What happened?" Allegra transferred the waffles to a plate, drowned them in syrup and took a bite. Zoe made a face at the sight of all the syrup.

"Mac woke up everyone with his screaming" Zoe replied, rolling her eyes. "Something about a video game or whatever. Like anyone cares."

"I see. I didn't hear anything. So that's why everyone's so mean this morning?"

"Pretty much" Moby confirmed. "Today's race should be nice and hostile." He shook his head. "And maybe a little violent to boot…"

"I swear, I'm going to murder Mac" Viggo announced when he came into the kitchen, running a hand through his blonde hair in a lost attempt to make it look less messy. He poked through the refrigerator absently.

"I thought you're usually the calm one" Allegra remarked. She was eating her breakfast standing at the island counter, positive that Zoe or Moby- or both- would destroy her if she said something that annoyed them and if she was near enough, given their foul moods. She inched farther away from Viggo at this new sign of blatant hostility.

"If he  _ever_ does that again…" Viggo warned, inspecting an orange and then pitching it back into the fruit drawer, "I'll kill him. Three times."

"Ooo-kay." Allegra didn't want to be the one to tell him that his plan sounded rather impossible.

"Hey, I'm not the worst this morning" Viggo pointed out, looking at an apple he'd found. "Whoever just came through here practically took out the damn door."

"Yeah, and I thought that slamming doors was your psycho thing" Zoe added, and Viggo threw the apple he was holding in her general direction. His aim was far off, though, and it hit the window harmlessly. "I mean, you pretty much scared the hell out of Kaori that one time" Allegra and Moby exchanged worried looks. Irritability, lack of notice due to exhaustion, whatever it was, it had driven Zoe across a line.

"Kaori's not even here" Viggo said evenly, giving Zoe one last chance to backtrack. She ignored it.

"You know. Two weeks ago. Right before you stopped talking to Nate." There was a two-second pause of dead silence.

"Why the fuck is everyone so fucking involved in this?" Viggo finally shouted, "Who the fuck cares what I do or who I don't talk to? It has nothing to do with anyone! It's not even a big deal!"

"If it's such a 'not a big deal', then why haven't you spoken in two weeks? That's not normal, so don't even try to pass it off like that"

"Who says it's not normal? I only met the guy three weeks ago!"

"Yeah, and for the first week, you were friends!"

"Why the hell are you defending him?!"

"I'm not! I'm just saying that you're being stupid! I don't know what the hell went on, but I'm sure that whatever it is, you've blown it way out of proportion!"

"You have no idea" Viggo said, voice deadly quiet, "what happened. Or what it means to me. So don't get involved. You know  _nothing._ You have  _no fucking idea_ what the  _fuck is going on._ So  _leave me the fuck alone._ " With that, he left the room before Zoe could retaliate.

No one said anything for a while.

"I have  _never_ seen him so mad" Moby finally spoke first. Zoe shrugged a shoulder. "Like, ever. He's usually such a chill dude."

"Seriously. It's pretty hard to rile him like that" Allegra contributed. Zoe sighed heavily.

"Now I feel bad. Damn." She shoved her chair back and stood up. "Where did he go?"

"Why, you feel like having your head ripped off?" Allegra watched Zoe leave the room. "Okaaay…"

"What's goin' on?" Mac's voice came from the doorway. He was walking and playing his game at the same time, which nearly resulted in him walking into the counter island.

"I dunno, but it's pretty much partly your fault" Moby contributed helpfully, if more than a little menacingly. "Waking everyone up at two in the morning. I've got half a mind to make you sleep outside tonight."

"Griff had deleted my game!" Mac turned red then, "At least, uh, I thought so."

"Let me ask you, mate. Why the hell were you noticing this at two AM?"

"Because I was going to play."

"At two in the morning."

"Yeah. Got a problem with that?"

"YES!"

Allegra remained in the kitchen after everyone had left. She looked at the clock, and saw that only an hour had gone by.

"I still don't get it…" she sighed, shaking her head. "Maybe everyone's just crazy…"

"IT'S NOT MY FAULT!" Mac's hysterical screaming came from somewhere upstairs. "I SWEAR IT WASN'T MY FAULT, PSYMON!"

"YOU SCREAMED AT TWO AM!"

"THAT DOESN'T MEAN YOU CAN THROW ME OUT A WINDOW!"

Allegra sighed. "Craaazzzyyy..."

"Only because Mac ruined everyone's day" Elise said, coming into the kitchen. "Although, truly, everyone  _is_ always crazy..."

……………….

Zoe couldn't decide if it was convenient, or just really, really awkward. Both she and Viggo had missed the gondola back down the mountain after the final race, and had to wait for it to come back. Griff was with them, but he was off in the snow somewhere, so neither paid him any mind. They stood there on the deck of the station, completely silent. Zoe played with the end of her blue-streaked ponytail, gaze sliding over to Viggo. He was leaning back against the deck railing, one hand holding his snowboard up beside him. He was pretending -rather convincingly- that she didn't exist.

"I  _do_ exist" Zoe informed him. He made a little growling noise and didn't comment. Another silence. "I didn't mean to say that this morning." No response. "I don't actually know what's going on, so I probably shouldn't harass you about it." Still nothing. "It just freaks me out to see you all quiet when you're usually so happy. That's all. Everyone thinks that." Viggo finally looked at her.

"I probably shouldn't have gone off on you like that" he allowed. The gondola came back into the station, and Viggo started across the deck.

"Do you want to talk about it?" Zoe asked hopefully. She usually knew what was going on with people, it was just a matter of watching them, seeing what they reacted to, what they resented and what they agreed to willingly. But she, like everyone else, had only seen the before and after of Nate and Viggo's relationship. Hardly anyone knew what had happened in between, leaving the story with a gap where the essential part was.

"Not really" Viggo answered listlessly, looking right past her. "Griff, you coming?"

"Viggo" Zoe said, in a last desperate attempt to reach out to him, "talk to Nate."

"Why?"

"Because" Zoe didn't know how to tell him without possibly making it worse.

"Well?"

"Because" She tried again, "you were happier when you were talking to him." Viggo didn't say anything, and she wondered if he understood what she was talking about. "When you liked him." She added. He understood. "Will you talk to him?"

"I don't think so" Viggo replied quietly, as Griff joined them, thus ending the conversation abruptly.

Elise hardly noticed that the door to her room was gone again, it had been vanishing on and off for days anyways, everyone was used to it. She just decided to thank the diabolical duo, because when she walked by Nate's room, she could see him going through his suitcase, as he raked a hand through his wet hair and tried to decide on a shirt. He was wearing only jeans, fresh from the shower. She paused in the hallway a little longer than anyone else would have, half hoping he'd turn around.

"Oh, Nate!" She called out decidedly. He turned, allowing her to see him shirtless.

"Hmm?"

"Nice race today" she swept off, smiling to herself.  _Didn't know he had a six pack. That's rather impressive…_

She returned to her room, but as she passed the bed, tripped on something. She glanced down, and saw Griff's foot.

"Griff, get out from under there" she commanded. He crawled up from under her bed. "What're you doing?"

"Hiding from Mac. He's mad cuz I'm better at his game than he is" There was more pride in Griff's voice than anything else, which was probably had gotten him into trouble in the first place.

"You're just  _asking_  for it now, basically."

"Oh. Oops." His grin wrote him off as being none to serious, though.

Mac, meanwhile, wasn't thinking about his game for once. He was looking for Kaori. "There you are!" he looked into her room and found her reading.

"Hello, Mac-kun!" She gave him a radiant smile, putting her book on the chair's arm. "How are you?"

"Besides being the guy everyone wants dead, okay."

"You did wake everyone up."

"Not on purpose."

"You screamed."  
"Because Griff touched my game."

"Sure" Kaori's look told Mac that she didn't believe him in the slightest.

"Anyways. I wanted to ask you something" He sat on the edge of her bed. "What do you know about Elise and Nate?"

"Why don't you ask Elise or Nate-kun?"

"Because Elise wouldn't tell me and Nate has no idea. Pleeaaassseee?" He gave her a pitiful pleading look and she relented instantly.

"Elise wants Nate to date her seriously. She said she wants to wait a week for him to do it himself, and then she'll ask."

"When did she decide that?"

"Three days ago, I think. But Mac-kun, why is this important to you?"

"Not me." Mac stood up.

"Who, then?"

"Secret. But thanks for your help." Mac ran off. He skidded around the corner and ran right into Psymon. "EEAAAUUUGGHH!" Mac backed up and ran in the other direction, knowing that Psymon's dearest wish was to revenge Mac for waking him up.

"Smart kid" Psymon remarked, going into his own room. Mac ran into his own room. Viggo was there, watching TV with Griff, and debating whether he was still mad that Nate had been so worried about him.

"He thinks I'm pathetic" he announced. Mac disregarded the nonsense statement- he didn't know what Viggo was talking about- and flopped down on the other bed. He thought about telling Viggo what Kaori was said.

No, he decided, Viggo didn't need to know that right now- Mac didn't want to be the one to completely ruin his day.

But he had to.

"Elise is going to ask out Nate" Mac said, not thinking. He just didn't want to be blamed when it turned out to be too late or something.

Viggo dropped his head into his hands and said nothing.

 _Damn,_ Mac thought,  _Mac-the-day-ruiner strikes again..._

 


	10. A fighter can't be a lover: Now

 "Wake up! Wake up!" Griff was bouncing on Mac's bed. Mac groaned and kicked at him. Griff stumbled and fell off the bed. He tumbled backwards and landed on Viggo.

"OW!" Viggo flailed around on the floor, shoving Griff off of him.

"You shouldn't sleep on the floor" Griff grumbled, jumping back onto Mac's bed.

"Yeah, you want to give me your bed instead?"

"You could always-" Griff started, and Mac gave him an absolutely murderous look. "Anyways. Wake up! Wake up!"

"I'm AWAKE, Griff!" Mac yelled, heaving a pillow at Griff's head. "What do you want?"

"We're leeaaavvinnnggg today!"

"About time. We've only been here three weeks." Mac burrowed further under the covers. "Pack my stuff for me, will you?"

"Where're we going?" Viggo picked himself up off the floor, tossing his blankets onto the bed.

"Metro City!"

"Awesome!" Mac's head appeared from under the covers. "So we get to stay at our apartments, right?"

"Um…. No."

"No?!"  
"Not everyone has one" Griff made a pouty face.

"Like who?" Viggo started to pick up his clothes from where they were strewn about the

room.  _I'll have to go check that I didn't leave anything in Nate's room,_ Viggo thought, gathering shirts from under the bed,  _maybe he'll leave or something today so I can go when he's not there._

"Um… well, most people, actually. Moby doesn't, and Kaori doesn't-"

"She got one" Mac contributed.

"Okay. So then, um… Viggo, you don't have one!"

"I'm still looking around for the perfect place."

"And… and… I don't have one!" Griff finished triumphantly.

"Whatever, dude." Mac threw back the covers, standing and stretching lazily. "I still think you guys should just stay at the lodge and let everyone else go to their places, but whatever…"

"What do you mean, they're the same room assignments?" Nate had gotten the news delivered to him by Moby. He slung his duffle bag over his shoulder, following Moby closely out of the lodge. Moby turned, nearly hitting Nate in the head with his bag.

"Don't shout at me, mate. I didn't make the rules." Moby paused. "I mean, not really." He crossed the porch and opened the trunk of the SUV. Nate threw his bag in after Moby's, waiting until Moby turned to him.

"What do you mean, not really?!" Moby backed up a few steps, snow crunching under his boots.

"Ah, you see, the director was lookin for someone to help with the room assignments, and everyone else was out practicing or whatever, so he asked me, and-"

"And?" Nate advanced a few steps, and Moby stood his ground.

"And I told him they were fine! What's the big deal? Oh, wait, are you scared you'll piss off Viggo again? Gonna get into another standoff? Just because you and him have got this weird history doesn't mean-"

"What weird history?" Moby almost took another step back, but chose instead to just glare up at Nate. Menace or none in Nate's voice- and there was plenty there- Moby wasn't that much of a pushover.

"Mate, someone flirts with me for a week solid, I wouldn't tick them off so much, and I certainly wouldn't flip out about it like this!"

"Yeah? And if it was you and, like, Zoe or someone in this situation? You'd be flipping out too!" Their voices rose steadily, but still no one came outside to break them up.

"I wouldn't have fucked it up as much as you did!" Moby crossed his arms over his chest, challenge all over his face, even if he wouldn't say it. Nate saw it, though, whether Moby wanted him to or not.

"Like hell you wouldn't." Nate snapped back at him.

Elise stopped in the middle of the living room to adjust the strap of her duffle bag, but her fingers froze on the buckle. She'd heard yelling, she was positive, but from where…?

"Hey, Elise" Zoe called, jumping over the last stairs on the staircase. She readjusted the strap of her backpack on her shoulder. "Are Nate and Moby seriously fighting, or am I seeing things?"

"Doubt it. Nate's a lover, not a fighter." Elise flipped her hair over her shoulder, a cool smile on her lips, though Zoe couldn't say if Elise knew this from personal experience or not. However, Zoe had the suspicion that the light smudge of pink lipstick she'd seen on Nate's cheek once would match exactly with the lipstick Elise was wearing. Zoe pushed that thought aside and just shrugged.

"Hate to break it to you, but right now, he's just a fighter. No lovin', just fightin'."

"What?!" Elise ran after her out of the lodge. As Zoe had said, Moby and Nate were really in a literal fight, and as they watched, one or the other was yanked down to the snow, behind the SUV. The yelling Elise had heard was indeed real, but had since been reduced to groaned curses and half finished sentences.

"I'll show  _you_ to- fucking fuck with me" Moby sounded confident with his statement.

"I- did-  _not-_ fuck-anything-up-you-total-" Nate's voice was cut off, presumably by Moby's fist.

"Fucking liar! You're just so-"

"Shit, you hit me-"

"Don't you  _dare_ blame me for-"

"I'll blame whoever the fuck I  _want"_

"Moby!" Zoe came out of the trance first, dropping her duffle on the porch and sprinting over, Elise following suit. "Moby, cut it out!" She latched onto Moby's jacket, straining to separate him from Nate. "Would you help or something?" She looked up at Elise, tightening her hold on Moby. Elise attempted to drag Nate back, but her fingers ran over his jacket as he moved away, nearly yanking it off of him instead of actually restraining him any.

"Let me  _go!"_ Moby was insisting, twisting in Zoe's grip. Zoe's gaze met Elise's; neither was able to keep the two apart for long. Elise's fingertips slipped over his skin, hot to the touch, and she scrambled to grab onto his jacket again, but then Moby broke loose of Zoe's grip and started in on Nate again.

"Stop it!" Elise renewed her efforts in trying to pull Nate back, but he hardly even noticed her. She caught sight of Allegra running over, and hoped she'd help. Allegra just stood there next to her for a moment, brown eyes curious as she watched the scuffle, one hand playing with the end of her braid.

"Do something!" Zoe screamed at her. Allegra paused. A suspiciously delighted smile ghosted over her face. Then she kicked Nate in the shin with her steel-toed boot.

"OW!" He howled, staggering. Moby took advantage of this, hitting him square in the cheek with another hard punch. Allegra kicked him next and he stumbled backwards too. Zoe wrapped her arms around Moby, holding him back, and nodded to Allegra to get Nate, as Elise had proved completely unable. Elise stepped back to let Allegra take her place, watching as if in a daze. Allegra didn't hesitate, just jerked Nate back by the hood of his jacket, making him choke, but stop attacking Moby. Zoe and Allegra waited a few moments to make sure the two wouldn't start again, and released their grasps. Moby scooted back through the snow frantically, and Nate just leaned back against the car, breathing hard. Blood drops littered the snow around Moby, from his hand, and there was a thin streak of blood dripping down Nate's cheek.

"What the hell was that about?!" Allegra put her hands on her hips, looking from one to the other. She tapped her toe up and down on the snow, and the two on the ground cringed. Their fight may have been short, Elise saw, but it had been intense enough to leave damage. Moby's lip was bleeding, and he had bruises on his arms already. Nate had a cut across his forearm, a bruise on his cheek, and various other bruises. Neither fighter seemed to notice his injuries, however.

"He started it" Moby pointed at Nate, who shook his head fervently.

"I did not!"

"All I said was that I helped with the new room assignments!"

"You called me a goddamn jerk!"

"Yeah, because you were  _being_  a goddamn jerk! I'm not taking it back!"

"I was not! You said I fucked up everything!"

"Yeah- you did!" Nate lunged at him again, and Moby scrambled back to hide behind Zoe's legs. Zoe kicked at him, but his fingers didn't unclasp from around her ankles.

"Talk about a sore point" Allegra rolled her eyes, and stomped hard on Nate's hand.

"OW! That was my  _hand!"_

"I know" she raised her foot again, and Nate snatched his hand back, cowering back by the car. "You can get into a full-blown brawl, and can't take it?"

"You've got steel in your boots!" Elise just watched in silence, unable to comprehend the thought that this perceived lover was a fighter. The idea repelled her.

"Yo, dudes, what's going on out here?" Mac's duffle bag came flying through the air, and landed near Elise, making her flinch. Mac followed it, trudging through the deep snow.

"You couldn't just walk it over?" Zoe arched an eyebrow. Mac picked up his bag and threw it in the general direction of the trunk, making it in only from luck.

"That was faster. And, wow, dawg, did you get hit by a truck?" He stared at Moby, who just pointed at Nate, expressionless. "Did you get hit too? Dude, where's the psycho truck driver? Where'd he go? I don't see any tire tracks!" he looked around the clearing, until Zoe's sigh made him stop. "Whaaaatttt?"

"There was never any truck, dumb ass" Zoe informed him stonily.

"Duuuude, seriously? Cuz I didn't think a truck could make it up here through all this snow- oh, I get your drift" he nodded his head, understanding look on his face. "Psymon threw another door again, didn't he? Or- oh my God, was he driving that snow bulldozer thing again?! EAAUUG-"

"No!" Moby cut him off in mid-scream, and looked around from behind Zoe to glare over at Mac, "You thick-headed moron! We got in a fight, that's what happened! That stupid idiot bloke over there fuckin'  _punched_ me-"

"You started it!" Nate protested, but stopped speaking when he saw Allegra move her foot.

" _You_ got in a fight?" Mac stared wide-eyed at Nate. "Dawg, I could believe Moby, he's an idiot, but you? Dude. Wow."

Nate said nothing, but his glare alone informed Mac that he didn't appreciate the observation.

The boarders finished packing everything, and started the task of sorting themselves into the two cars- the convertible had been returned, after seeing what had happened to Elise's. The SUV and the smaller SUV were left.

"I like the small car" Griff volunteered first, jumping down the porch steps when he saw that everyone was gathered together to decide such.

"I'll drive it" Zoe volunteered.

"I wanted to…" Moby glared down at the snow.

"Seeing as it's half your fault that the convertible got sent back, you don't deserve it. And since I'm driving, I get to decide who I take."

"Miss Dictator" Allegra muttered under her breath.

"Just for that, you're banned from my car" Zoe looked down at Allegra sternly, "You're going in the SUV."

"Fine, I didn't want to go with you anyways." Allegra stuck her tongue out at Zoe, and went to throw her stuff into the trunk of the SUV. "Miss Dictator" she muttered before leaving.

"I'll go in the SUV!" Psymon offered all-too enthusiastically.

"God, no. I don't want you and her together" Zoe interrupted, pointing back towards Allegra. "I don't want to die."

"So what're you going to do about it, huh?"

"You don't even want to know" Zoe growled, and Psymon made a face at her and went to claim a seat in the smaller car.

"I'm driving the SUV!" Allegra yelled over from where the car was parked.

"Who's the dictator now?" Zoe rolled her eyes. "Okay. Moby, wanna come with me?"

"Yeah, sure." Moby was sulking on the fringe of the group, across the circle from Nate, who was stubbornly glaring at the snow and not making eye contact with anyone. Moby left to transfer his stuff from the SUV trunk to that of the other car.

"Great. That means that  _you're_ not coming" Zoe pointed to Nate, who ignored her completely.

"Why not?" Griff asked, returning and starting to pout about it. He'd wanted to go in the same car as Nate- it raised his chances of getting to borrow Nate's mp3 player, which had the best song mix.

"Well, if he really wants to" Zoe shrugged.

"Zoe" Elise hissed in her ear, "separate them, for heaven's sake. Take Viggo instead."

"Whatever" Zoe shrugged again. "Fuck off, Nate, you're kicked out of my car." Nate glared at her, then left for the SUV as if the idea had been entirely his own. The car door slammed.

"How do we even get there?" Elise asked Zoe.

Allegra was fiddling with the dashboard knobs and buttons. She adjusted the rear view mirror so she could see Nate, who was sitting in the third row, clearly furious.

"What the hell was all that about?" She asked. They could only dimly hear the voices of the others outside the car, arguing about directions.

"Nothing."

"Sure?" she tapped on the dashboard plastic, to see if she could move the arrow on the gas tank gauge. She couldn't.

"Yes."

The conversation ended, and Allegra wasn't about to bring it back to life.  _Let him sulk,_ she thought vaguely,  _ooh, a speedometer… it lights up! How cool!_

"Yo, don't I get a say?" Mac piped up in the conversation outside the car. "I wanna go in the SUV, it's got the good CD player" he started over without waiting for conformation.

"I want that CD player too. Mac, wait, we must take turns!" Kaori ran after him before he could claim shotgun and therefore complete control of the music. Both were disappointed when they saw that Allegra already had shotgun reserved.

"Nah nah" She stuck her tongue out at them. "Kids go in the back"

"Okay, we're all set" Elise said, going over and opening the shotgun side door. Kaori and Mac were already bickering over the CD player. They drove out of the lot. At forty miles an hour, nearly clipping the sign for the lodge. Elise sighed, looking out the window.  _This will be a fun eight hours,_ she thought sarcastically.  _Allegra drives like a psycho, Mac and Kaori are acting like they're five, and Nate's taken a vow of silence and anger. This is just great._

But she knew that her bad mood was mostly due to the last item on her list.

According to Elise, a fighter couldn't be a lover.

Never.

 

 


	11. Perfection: Now

Mac felt like screaming, but he knew from experience that it wouldn't get him anything but a whole lot of hostility sent his way. He tried to turn up the volume on his mp3 player, but it was already up all the way. Although they'd agreed to share the CD player, after the first hour, Allegra had given Kaori total control of it, saying she didn't want to listen to Mac's rap music, because, according to her, it all sounded the same anyways.  _This is no fun,_ Mac thought, glaring out the window, rap screaming in his ears,  _it_ ** _would_** _be fun if everyone was in a good mood, but nooooo. I mean, if Nate wasn't being such a jerk I could, like, take his mp3 player! That'd be fun! And maybe if Allegra wasn't driving, it'd be entertaining. But nooo. Hell, I'd even rather be in the other car._ Allegra was concentrating on both getting them to Mercury City in one piece, and getting them as close to death as possible, at the same time. Elise was either asleep or deep in thought. Kaori had ticked him off, with her music choices. And Nate was sitting by himself in the third row, completely isolating himself from them not only physically, but mentally, and, Mac was convinced, emotionally, too.

"Yo, dude" Mac turned to face Nate, trying yet again to get some sort of reply. Maybe he could anger him into talking. Everyone had avoided talking about what had happened, but Mac thought that maybe if he tackled it head-on, he'd get somewhere. "What happened with you and Moby?" Nate just shook his head slightly, half-mouthing  _nothing,_ and adding a silencing glare. "Oookay" Mac slid back down in his seat. Then Elise turned around and smacked him in arm with her book. "Ow, that's a  _hardcover!"_ he yelped.

"Shut up" She hissed. He gave her a confused look.

"About?" Elise angled the book so Nate wouldn't be able to lip read off of her.

"Him and Moby" she barely whispered. "Shut the fuck up!"

"Yeah?" Mac decided he'd had enough of her being controlling. "I'll ask about whatever I want! Don't I have some sort of a right to know?"

"No!"

Kaori watched them go back and forth nervously, Allegra did nothing.

"I just wanted to know what the hell's going on, is that so bad? I mean, it's not every day two people who get along just beat each other up like that!" Mac exclaimed. He forced himself not to look away from those piercing blue eyes, even though he felt like she was about two seconds from reaching out and choking him.

"There's no reason you have to know, Mac!"

"So what? Maybe I just  _wanna_ know!"

"Everyone does" Elise's voice dropped down to less than a whisper. "But pissing him off isn't the way to go about finding out." She ended the conversation by turning back around, proceeding to ignore him completely. He kicked the back of her chair once for good measure- hard enough to make her mad and still be passed off as an accident, but not hard enough to get himself murdered- and went back to staring out the window.

_Only seven more hours…_

Half an hour later, Elise was still thinking about the fight. She'd tried a thousand different angles, but from every single one, Nate was still nothing but a fighter.

"Damn" She sighed softly, deciding to give up.

"What?" Allegra glanced back to make sure no one else was listening; Mac was asleep, Kaori wasn't paying attention, and Nate was still in his own world.

"Nothing…"

"Don't give me that." Allegra said, something of a warning in her tone. Elise gave in.

"I just… that whole fight. It was totally a new side of… both of them."

"Not really. Moby's always been something of a maniac." Allegra said cheerfully. Elise shrugged a shoulder. "But I didn't know Nate was totally insane too."

"Thanks for putting it so gently."

"What? You're surprised?"

"Yes" Elise looked down instead of meeting Allegra's dark eyes.

In the other car, meanwhile, Moby was also close to screaming, but it was because Psymon had spent the past eight hours texting Allegra, and reading out loud every button he pressed. By the time they got there, he was ready to choke someone.

"Where's this?" Moby asked Zoe, staring at the hotel she'd just parked in front of.

"The hotel."

"Where's the lodge?"

"Under construction" Zoe said, looking away innocently.

"Still? Thanks a lot, Zo." He said, pretending to be mad. "Next time think twice before you take a bulldozer after Psymon, okay?"

"Okay…"

Moby had been worried about what would happen when he saw Nate, but Nate wasn't around. "Where's Nate?" he asked Elise, following her through the front doors of the hotel.

"Dunno." She said vaguely.

"He's probably off sulking" Allegra said cheerfully, coming up behind them. "Seeing as he didn't talk for eight hours."

"Hmm." Moby said, a smirk appearing on his face. It worried Elise greatly.

…………………….

"Where're you going?" Moby looked around in surprise at the sound of Mac's voice. Then he spotted Mac, who was sitting on the floor of the hallway.

"Mate, what are you doing?"

"Chillin." Mac shrugged. "What're you doing?"

"I dunno… nothing much…"

"Right, liar" Mac got to his feet, grinning. "I'm thinking this has something to do with Nate." Moby sighed heavily.

"There's something up with him. I dunno what it is, but he's been a head case since the second week on the tour. So I'm gonna find out what it is, in a way that won't get a steel-toed boot in my face."

"Yeah, asking him was pretty stupid" Mac contributed. Moby ignored him, walking towards the elevator. Mac followed, though. "So where're you going?" The doors slid open, and Mac joined him in the elevator too. "You can trust me, dude. I'm bored out of my freakin' mind, I want something to do. Plus, I'm hungry."

"I'm not stopping for food." Mac considered.

"Please?"

"No. You still want to come?" They arrived on the lobby floor.

"Yeah! Mission information! What're we doing?"

"We're going to investigate this until we figure out what's going on!" Moby declared, crossing the lobby.

"Yeah!" Mac agreed enthusiastically. "And maybe he'll have something good in his kitchen!"

"Ye- wait, what?" Moby stopped and stared at Mac. Mac pumped his fist in the air and grinned.

"Something good in his kitchen!"

"Uh… like what?"

"Like, I dunno, a cupcake or something! Let's go!" Moby groaned as Mac charged out the door. The revolving door nearly took out Elise, who was coming in.

"Where're you guys going?" she stopped, pocketing the car keys and looking from one to the other.

"Nate-stalking. Wanna come?" Elise hesitated for a moment. And then she accepted. For a split second, Mac considered asking Viggo along, but then decided against it. Viggo always got weird at any mention of Nate.

"Are we going to his apartment?"

"Yup." Moby started for the door.

"Wait, wait, I'll be right back, I just want to run upstairs, right back" Moby groaned and said they'd wait.

Five minutes later, Elise reappeared in the lobby, and followed Mac and Moby out to the car. Elise didn't ask why they wanted information on Nate, and they didn't ask her. Her reason, though, was something she wasn't quite willing to admit.  _I want him to be perfect again,_ she thought, gazing out the window as Moby sped down the streets of New Metro City. She could just see Metro City in the distance; Metro City was the racetrack for them, and New Metro was the part with the buildings that were occupied.  _He was perfect before the fight, I want that back._

The apartment was only ten minutes away, during which Moby swore fervently at the rest of traffic. Once they were at the door of Nate's apartment, though, Elise started to wonder just how well-thought out his plan was.

"Do you even know where Nate is right now?" she leaned against the tan wall, watching Moby examine the doorknob, Mac looking over his shoulder.

"Er… no. Why do I need to know where the bloke is?"

"He could be inside." Elise pointed out. Mac looked at her with widened eyes.

"Is he?" Elise toyed with the idea of torturing Mac, but decided he was just too pathetic a victim. She'd leave that to Allegra.

"No, he's at the hotel."

"Great" Moby stood back.

"What're you doing?"

"Gonna kick the door down" He announced. Elise stared at him. Moby took a step back.

"Don't!" She broke in before he could do any damage. He raised an eyebrow. "I've got the key."

"Where'd you get that?" Mac asked, obviously impressed.

"Swiped it off his key ring when I went upstairs." She gave them a cool smile and let them in. The apartment was pretty average. A mess, but average. The three split up to look for whatever it was each was looking for.

"No cupcakes." Mac's disappointed voice came from the kitchen. "Jerk. What else is there? Let's see… ooh, I found ice cream! Ah, damn, it's empty. Stupid tiny little cartons. What else…" While Mac tore through the kitchen, Elise wandered over to the bookcase. Surely his reading material would prove him more than just a mindless fighter. "It's all stupid fruit and stuff. Damn vegetables. And… ooh! Yes! Yes! Chocolate-covered pretzels! My life has meaning again!"

Elise continued to go through the bookcase, stopping when she recognized a book. She slid it out and opened it. On the inside of the cover, there was a small pocket for the audio CD that came with the book. And tucked behind the small CD was a folded-over square of paper. Curious, she withdrew it from behind the CD and unfolded it, wondering if she'd perhaps stumbled across some wonderfully romantic memento, or something that would confirm her hopes that he was, at heart, not a fighter.

"Oh my God." Elise stared down at the item that had fallen into her palm. Tears sprang to her eyes. What had fallen out of the paper was a small, silver razor, the type more commonly found in toolboxes. Not hidden. "oh…" The reddish stains near the blade… "No, no, no!"

"What's wrong?" Moby came around the corner of the hallway. "What have you got there?" Elise could only shake her head no, fighting back tears. He plucked it from her hand. "Bloody hell" he breathed, eyes wide. "You don't think…"

"I don't know" Elise felt like her perfect illusion was shattered, and now the pieces were falling away, one by one.

"Find out." Moby said shortly. Elise just nodded mutely.

"I will…" Her perfection shattered just a little more, and she scrambled desperately to keep the pieces together for just a little while longer.

………………..

"Viggo!" Elise stuck her head into the room belonging to Mac and Griff, where Viggo was hiding from Nate. "Can I borrow your room key?"

"Um… sure" He pushed his bangs out of his eyes, looking around for it on the floor. "Here… what do you want it for?"

"Oh, nothing. Thanks!" she continued to Nate's room and opened the door. He was going through his suitcase lazily, kneeling on the floor by the duffle. "Hey Nate."

"Um… hi." He gave her a bewildered look. "How'd you get in…?"

"Viggo's key. Anyways." She pocketed the key, and stepped forward. She dropped to her knees before him, and then pushed him back onto the floor. He looked completely puzzled as she stayed above him.

"Elise, what…?"

"Shh." She sat back on her heels, and pushed up his jeans so she could see his shins. His skin was free of scars, but there was a bruise from Allegra's boot.

"Elise-" She leaned forward and kissed him hard on the lips, to shut him up. It worked. Her fingertips danced over his belt buckle, but she figured that it wouldn't be easy to explain tearing off his pants. She'd have to assume he didn't do any above-the-knee cutting. Where else… she recalled reading in a book about this. She moved next to push up his shirt, scanning his stomach for any signs of cutting, but there were just defined muscles, not marred. "Elise-" he tried again.

"Shhhh…" another furious kiss to silence him, it was just a tool to her now, she derived no passion, she was so wrapped up in discovering this. She heard footsteps in the doorway, but didn't even care. They left, she didn't even know who it was. Her eyes fell on Nate's wrist. He moved his hand as it if to get up, and her hand shot out to hold his wrist down. One sleeve was already pushed back, and she shoved back the other. Her fingers fumbled to slide back the bracelets he wore, one brown leather, one black, one of string, she'd never thought that this was why…

"Elise…" Elise didn't even hear him. She noticed the look of terror that flickered in his eyes, the way he tensed up, knew she'd hit on it. She forced herself to look. Her fingers flew to cover her open mouth, eyes wide, tears forming her eyes again.

Six scars.

The fingers of her other hand traced over the three scars on each wrist, the three perfectly in line, nothing but deliberate. Short, deep, right over the vein… it made her almost shudder with horror. She sat back, and Nate took the opportunity to push himself up and scoot away from her, to sit against the wall of the corner. The terror hadn't yet left his eyes, and he turned his wrists towards himself, away from her. He just looked so… so cornered, so attacked and so vulnerable, she couldn't even believe he'd done that…

"I was hoping I wouldn't find anything" Elise finally spoke. Nate looked away.

"Yeah, well, you didn't have to go looking for anything."

"When?" She knew he didn't like her commanding voice, so she toned it down. "please… when?"

"High school." Nate's voice was hard, void of any emotion. "Tenth grade."

"You got over it?" hope fluttered in her heart.

"No. I got scared. Any more than six, and people wouldn't have fucking noticed, don't you think?" He stopped at the sign of feeling in his voice. "Tenth grade. Then I was done."

"But… why?" she asked, almost pleading for a reason, any reason, that could explain it away, that could make her understand.

"I don't know." Her heart sank. "I just… nothing was obviously wrong, but… suddenly everything was just too much for me." He stopped his explanation there.

Nate didn't want to tell her everything. He didn't want to say how the death of his last grandparent on his dad's side, something he'd thought wouldn't hurt him so much, had affected him, because his dad had become so different after that, how for ages after, he'd been quieter and more serious, until Nate had felt like he wasn't the same anymore. And then his mother's lack of patience had seemed to get that much worse, until he felt like he couldn't do anything right anymore, where everything he said came back to actively haunt him, tear at him. How he'd had something or other just set him off- something he'd read, he recalled- that had just been so depressing, it had sort of awakened that inside him, and after that, everything was wrong. It was just the last push he'd needed, he'd realized later. It could have been anything. And after that… he couldn't remember much. He'd blocked out the memories. He would have been able to convince himself it had never happened, he wanted to. Except for the evidence.

"I needed something I could see, that made me reconnect with reality" he finished quietly.

"You haven't done it since?"

"No…" not yet, he thought, but he was scared, he always, always was, that something would happen, and he wouldn't be able to stop himself. "Damn, Elise, why do you even  _care?"_ She looked down.

"I thought you were perfect." He sighed at this. She hoped, her last, last hope, that he was going to tell her something-  _anything-_ to make it better, to restore her hope.  _Tell me you're still perfect,_ she thought desperately, blue eyes locking on his brown eyes.

"Elise" he said, deep voice soft, "I'm farther from perfect than anyone knows."

 


	12. Scars: Now

Half an hour after Elise had quietly left, Nate was still sitting with his back against the corner wall, sure that his carefully rebuilt world was moments from falling apart again. Before she'd left, she'd murmured a small apology-  _I didn't think you were the type,_ to which he'd responded with an evasive  _how the fuck did you find out?_ She'd admitted it, and his last words to her were still a question in his mind-  _they searched my apartment? Who the hell does that?_ And beyond that slowly twisting thought, twisting so he could probe at it, try, likely without success, to find the answer, beyond that, there was another. Beyond that, the memories and all the thoughts that came with them, whirling, reeling, no longer ignored.  _I didn't think you were the type._ Nate sighed, looking down at his bare wrists; he hadn't allowed anyone to see the area where the scars were, not in years, the tan lines from the bracelets were tragically amusing, the scars themselves a sickening reminder. He could remember the exact feeling, slitting his skin, the dark blood, the absence of feeling. He wasn't the type, in some minds, but he'd felt that he'd  _deserved_ the release. Now, he realized that it wasn't so much an escape as another trap. He'd been, if he thought it through more precisely,  _exactly_ the type to do this. He hated confessing his feelings, couldn't stand that vulnerability, and he'd always felt that he had no right to be suffering. He couldn't find justification or validation in his own mind that gave him the peace of mind he needed. Thinking it back again, again, again, he saw the reasons, the causes, but it was all emotion. Nothing that was solid evidence. His old memories weaved through the newer ones, bringing with them pain he thought he'd left far behind.

_I didn't think you were the type._

_I thought you were perfect._

_I never thought you'd do something like this._

_I didn't think you were this unstable._

_I didn't know and I wish I still didn't._

_Why are you doing this to yourself?!_

But if he'd done so badly before, he was going to attempt to fix things now. He'd just made it harder for himself, though. It was always more difficult to face someone with his own self-injury on his mind, to be preoccupied with worrying that they'd see, that they'd know, and think of him differently. Nate didn't know how he could ever explain it to convince anyone he wasn't some sort of lost cause when the evidence of it was forever on his skin.

…………………

Viggo decided that he had to talk to Nate. If only to find out what the  _hell_ Elise was doing on top of Nate, he would. He'd been avoiding Nate since the race that morning, and had since taken to sulking in the front room of the Gray Base. He'd been lying on the ground in front of the fireplace, but after Allegra had accidentally stepped on him five times, had moved to the couch instead, to where the L-shaped couch made a right angle. He'd shucked off his jacket and long-sleeved shirt until he was down to a T-shirt, and was wrapped in a blanket instead.

"Hey." Nate's voice him Viggo jump. Nate was standing next to him, question in his eyes.

"What's up?" Viggo pretended not to care he was there, like they hadn't been in a silent standoff for the past three weeks. Nate sat next to him, silent for a few moments.

"What I said… that last thing I said to you …" Nate finally spoke up, hardly loud enough to be heard. Viggo couldn't believe that they hadn't actually spoken since then, it almost felt like wasted time, now that Nate actually said it, "I didn't mean it like you thought I did."

"Really." Viggo didn't sound like he believed Nate. He wrapped one bare arm around his knees, resting his head on his knees.

Nate tried to refocus his thoughts, but felt the hope slowly slipping away from him.

"I swear. I just… you surprised me, you know?" Nate struggled to make it sound better than it did at the moment.

"Nnnm." Viggo muttered. His blonde hair was a mess, and he ran one hand through it lazily, which just distracted Nate further.

"I… why is it so…"

"Why's it such a big deal to me?" Viggo snapped at him, lifting his head and glowering at Nate, brown eyes more hurt than angry however much he didn't want that to show, "Try hearing that kind of thing from the person  _you_ like, Nate, and see how it feels."

"I- what?" Nate's dark brown eyes held his confusion.

"What'd you expect me to think? You sounded like it was the worst thing in the world, and you know what? You're the last person in the world I want to hear that from."

"You- you  _like-"_  Nate was still struggling to form understandable sentences. Viggo didn't let up.

"Yeah, I like you. I have for a while. Since I met you, and all through since we weren't talking. And it's stupid and hopeless, but I love you. I don't even know why, there's just something- and it doesn't even matter, you know that? It doesn't matter at all, because you're a jerk, and if that wasn't enough, you're a jerk I don't have a chance with!" He jumped up, about to storm off. Nate reached out a hand to his arm, fingertips barely resting on the warm skin, as if to stop him, but Viggo jerked away. Then he froze, and his fingers wrapped around Nate's wrist. Nate saw what he was looking at and nearly broke down right there. He'd forgotten to hide the scars after Elise had torn away all his defenses that morning. And, to make matters worse, he'd been out in the snow, and when he was cold, the marks stood out more, dark and unforgiving. Viggo's eyes widened, a sort of strangled whimper escaping him.

"Viggo-" Nate tried. Everything had gone so wrong since he'd tried to apologize, so he should have expected that it would end up like this.

"No…" Viggo gave him a last hurt glance and left, the entire thing over in less than ten seconds. The door slammed.

"He sure likes to slam doors" Elise remarked, coming to the doorway from the kitchen. Nate slid back to lie on the couch, hands over his face.

"Hellloooo!" Allegra sang out, dancing into the room through the doorway Viggo had just exited through in a rush.

"What the hell are you so happy about?" Nate growled. Allegra waltzed by, pausing only to swat him in the head.

"Oh, nothing." Then she paused to reconsider his tone. "What the hell are  _you_ so pissed about?"

"Nothing."

"No, seriously, you're like, snarling."

"Fuck  _off,_ Allegra" Nate was positively snarling, but Allegra failed to notice his anger and just laughed.

"Where's my snowboard?"

"How should we know?" Elise leaned against the doorway, watching as Allegra found her board and ran for the door again.

"Going to go snowboarding with Psymon, be back later!" And Allegra was gone. On her way out, though, she nearly ran into Moby and Zoe, who went upstairs without even noticing her happy state.

"We're going to town for dinner, you guys" Moby informed them when they'd returned.

"See you all later." It didn't escape neither Nate nor Elise that the two were holding hands as they left.

"Is everyone hooking up today?" Nate snarled up at the ceiling. Elise shrugged.

"Maybe they're just better at it than you are." Nate sat up at that, turning to give her a questioning look. "What? I'm just assuming you are," She shrugged a shoulder. He gave her that emotionless look, making her wonder what he was thinking. And again, her discovery sneaked back into her mind again, made her wonder desperately what he was feeling.

"Am I really a jerk?" The question caught her by surprise.

"According to who?"

"Am I?" he persisted. She flipped her blonde hair over her shoulder and held up a hand, all in one fluid movement.

"Viggo seems to think so" was all she said. Nate fell silent again.  _I had a chance…_ he thought, , _and I've destroyed it. Why can't I do anything but screw up everything?_

He hated how familiar the whirl of emotions was. Hated what they reminded him of, and what they'd pushed him to do. Six times.

Nate hoped it wouldn't come to that.

Hoped, because he never felt like he had any control over it.

…………..

Mac was wondering why Viggo had even volunteered to accompany him on his walk to downtown if he was going to be silent the entire time. Mac had wanted a cappuccino or something, as well as a break from the arguing between Griff and Moby, who had found common ground to fight on- the best strategy for some online game- and Viggo had come with him. He'd run into Mac on his way out of the lounge, and joined him.

"Aren't you cold?" Mac broke the silence as they trudged down the snowy street. Viggo shrugged a shoulder. He just had on a light jacket, underneath which was a short-sleeved shirt.

"Not really."

Another silence.

"Something wrong?" Mac ventured. Viggo shrugged a shoulder, shoving his hands in his jacket pockets. Mac had thought something was up. Viggo was all tense and silent, and Mac knew he was resisting a total breakdown. "Clearly. What?"

"It's just…" Viggo exhaled, his breath visible in the cold, "Nate."

"Big surprise there" Mac rolled his eyes. "What about Nate?" Viggo hesitated at telling him, and Mac knew he was reluctant to tell a secret he was guarding.

"…he's..." Viggo hesitated some more.

"Is this about what Elise found out? Cuz I heard about that." Mac was starting to wonder if downtown really was only a mile away, or if perhaps Psymon had lied to him.

"Yeah, that." Viggo sighed. "I just… I can't even think. It's just so… I can't believe he  _did_ that" his voice cracked with desperation, "it's so…" he shook his head, gaze downcast at the snow. "He did that to himself, on purpose…"

"It's not like it was for no reason" Mac pointed out. He stopped to look at the street sign, which told him little.

"Exactly" Viggo breathed, coming to a stop beside him.

"Don't listen to Elise, dude. It's not cuz he's messed up or anything… don't listen to her, she doesn't know anything."

"I know…" Viggo followed him down the street again, in the direction Mac hoped downtown would be in. "it's because he was hurting that badly. And I just… I didn't know. I can't believe I didn't know. How bad was it that he did that to himself?" Mac just shrugged.  _However bad it was, it probably wasn't a good idea,_ he thought, not about to share it with Viggo,  _he didn't only hurt himself, either. It's been, like, years and years since that, and look how he's hurting Viggo, too. The guy's, like, two seconds from crying. But… I thought he hated Nate?_

"Dude, don't you hate Nate?"

"That's the other thing" Viggo said softly. "I don't."

"Huh?"

"I don't hate him."

"I got that much, dude." Mac waved a hand to get Viggo to go on. Viggo made a reluctant face.

"I… I like him. A lot. For a long time, and that's why when he said that, I got so mad at him."

"Oh." Mac stared at him, and almost ran into a pole. "Oh." Viggo nodded, falling silent again. "Oh."

"It's not that big of a shock." Viggo pointed out. "And… I told him. Today."

"You did? Seriously? What happened?"

"Not much. I yelled at him, and whatever he was going to say… well, that was when I saw his scars, freaked, and left."

"C'mon, dude, he's over it. He doesn't do that anymore." Mac made an ill-fated attempt to help.

"So what? The point is that he  _did."_ Viggo kicked at the snow, succeeding only in nearly tripping on the jutting-out edge of the sidewalk. "I… I wish he wasn't ever in so much pain, you know? He… he means a lot to me. Even if he doesn't like me back, I still… I dunno, just knowing that he did that, it's like this whole part of him I didn't know about. Like suddenly he's different… not different, just…" Viggo shook his head. "I don't know. But I… you're right." He said suddenly. Mac looked up.

"About?"

"I shouldn't care. Why the hell should I? He doesn't like me, and besides, he's over it."

"Dude, I'm not right." Mac hastened to tell him. "You just care cuz you like him. Which makes sense."

"Yeah? How the fuck does that make sense? I care and he doesn't. That makes a load of sense" Viggo snapped at him. Mac stopped to face him.

"That's not it, dude. I don't know shit about relationships, but even I know that you're upset that he slit his wrists-" Viggo flinched at the phrase, further proving Mac's point, "because that hurt him, and you don't want to see him hurt. And besides that, dude, it's not just him that it hurts. I mean, sure, it's over and all, but it's still there, and that means that even though you came years later, it's still gonna hurt you. So it makes sense." Viggo scuffed at the ground with the toe of his sneaker.

"Do you have to be so smart?"

"Uh-huh. I'm right, aren't I?"

"Yeah…"

They completed the rest of the walk downtown in silence. Mac's thoughts were concentrated on finding a way to get back at Psymon for lying to him about how far downtown was. Viggo was trying to come to terms with his latest discovery, failing, but at least less hysterical about it. Mac could tell, though, that he wasn't over it, not by far.

Viggo trailed along behind Mac on the way back to the hotel.  _He's probably right,_ Viggo thought morosely,  _that's why I care. I just… I can't believe he'd do something like that. And that no one had any idea. But if he was in so much pain before- did it stop? Or is he still…_ his thoughts froze. He let it echo around in his mind, not wanting to consider if Nate was truly still hurting.  _It's like when he's hurt, it hurts me. I mean, when Moby and him got in a fight, I kind of hated Moby for it. Except now… it was him. To himself._

_What am I supposed to think now?_

He stopped there, on that last, haunting idea that was the origin of his confused pain.

_What do I do, if I love him, if he might do that to himself again, if he hates me, and if the most pain he's ever been in… was due to himself?_

_What now?_

 


	13. Mac The Spicer Upper: Now

Mac was watching Nate sulk, which was half interesting and half utterly boring. The lounge was empty except for them, everyone else was either asleep, off somewhere having breakfast, or, in the case of Psymon and Allegra, momentarily missing. Mac was sprawled across two of the leather chairs in the hotel lounge on their floor, and Nate was off sulking in the corner, slouched down in a chair glaring at the wall.

"Where is everyone?" Mac said, just to break the nerve-wracking silence. Nate didn't even look at him.

"Where do you think? It's four AM."

"So why're you up?" Mac twisted around to look at Nate, but was hardly noticed.

"Couldn't sleep."

"Are you sharing your room with anyone?" At the question, Nate clenched his jaw and his voice was strained.

"No." Mac was interested to see he'd hit a nerve.

"Today's a chill-and-do-nothing day, huh?"

"Only until like, eight." This, Mac decided, was no fun.  _Mac the day ruiner has changed identities yet again,_ he thought, grinning,  _he is now Mac the Spicer-Upper! Here to spice up every dull day! And I'm going to get back at Moby! No one- NO ONE- deletes my game and gets away with it!_

"Viggo totally flipped out yesterday when he found out what you used to do." Nate's head snapped towards him, and his dark eyes were furious.

"He wasn't supposed to find out about that. No one was. If I ever find out who the hell got the idea to search my apartment-"

"It was Moby." Mac pushed himself up off the chair, waiting for his next thrill with interest.

"I'm going to  _kill_ him." Nate growled. Mac grinned.

"I've got his room key." He held up the key he'd found in the lounge. "Let's go search his apartment." Nate just looked at him for a moment. "I thought you wanted to get revenge on him. And besides, what if he's got, like,  _food_ in his kitchen?!"

"Well… yeah…" Nate contemplated it for a moment. Moby had, after all, been the one to make that particular discovery well-known. And Nate  _hated_ him for it… "let's go."

"Great. You drive."

"Haven't you been driving for, like, two years?"

"Dude, you don't wanna see me drive. Just trust me on that one, dawg. Not after last time." Nate arched an eyebrow at Mac's words.

"What happened last time?"

"Uh... I tried to go around a truck that was backing up." Mac grinned sheepishly. "Around behind it. So... yeah. I only just didn't get hit..." Nate shook his head.

"I'm definitely driving. Even I'm better than you are."

Twenty minutes later, Mac was in Moby's kitchen and Nate was watching him go through the cabinets. Like the rest of Moby's apartment, it was a chaotic mess.

"Why'd he do it? I mean, was he  _looking_ for something to ruin me?" Nate thought that he may have been talking to a brick wall for all the response he got.

"Ahahahahaha! Cupcakes!"

"For heaven's sake, Mac, that's just a stupid muffin!"

"Not for long!" Mac's hand appeared from behind the open refrigerator door. "Ta-da! Frosting! With the ability to make any muffin into a way-better cupcake!"

"Whatever…" Nate sank into a kitchen chair. "I mean, what did I think I'd find here? What could possibly make him seem worse than me?"

"I dunno, maybe he's a serial killer secretly" Mac said, slathering frosting onto the muffin. Nate glowered at him. "Okaaay, so maybe not. I don't know, dude." He continued to go through Moby's refrigerator after finishing the muffin-turned-"cupcake" in a matter of seconds.

"Did Viggo really flip out?" Nate propped his elbow on the table, chin in his hand. Mac opened the freezer, glancing back over his shoulder at Nate.

"Yeah."

"Really?"

"Totally, dude. I mean… you… well, no, that sounds jerk-ish." Mac closed the freezer, dropped to his knees in front of a cupboard door.

"What?"

"I was just gonna say… you really hurt him. So yeah, he was freaked. He just…" Mac shook his head.

"That hurt him?"

"Hell, dude, you killed him inside." Mac backtracked when he saw Nate's crushed look. "I mean, not exactly killed him, it just… uh… destroyed him a little bit?"

"I didn't want to do that…" Nate looked down.

"Talk to him, dude."

"Right. Great advice. I'll just go up to him, be like, hey sorry I completely destroyed you by destroying myself, still want to date me? That'll work  _real_ well." This made Mac turn and stare at him, though. "What?"

"You were speaking, like, hypotheticantilaciously, right?"

"You mean hypothetically?" Nate stared at him with a look that clearly said  _hypotheticantilaciously? What the hell is that?!_

"Yeah, that. Right?" Mac ignored the look. Nate shrugged a shoulder.

"Sure I was." It didn't sound particularly convincing, though. Mac continued to stare at him.

"You had to wait until we've like, broken into Moby's apartment to tell anyone this? Dude, this would have saved your ass back on the first day!"

"What?"

"Dude." Mac shook his head. "Do you have a thing for Viggo?"

But Nate wasn't about to tell him, or anyone else.

Including Viggo himself.

"No."

...

Mac and Nate returned from their break-in adventure at seven, after finding nothing but a lot of weird British foods, enough cologne to start a small business, and a particularly interesting fish in the aquarium containing about twenty.

"So… are you gonna give back his fish?" Nate shut the car door after Mac. Seeing as Mac had opened the door with his foot, Nate didn't really trust him with closing it.

"Why should I?" Mac was holding a plastic baggie filled with water, and Moby's spazzy neon fish.

"It's his fish!" Nate threw his hands into the air, but Mac just plowed on through the snow in front of the hotel.

"It likes me better" Mac insisted. Nate shook his head.

"I can't believe you stole his fish."

"I can't believe you're in love with-" Mac began smugly, and Nate whirled around.

"I will  _kill you,_ Mac, if you so much as breathe a  _fucking word_ about what you seem to  _think_ I-"

"Duuude, I was just gonna say, your baby of a snowboard" Mac grinned. "Who'd you think I was going to say? Hmm?"

"No one" Nate started towards the hotel again, sulky again. "I hope Moby kills you for stealing his fish."

As soon as Mac sneaked by Moby's room, Moby's voice rang through the hall.

"Mac! Hold up a second, mate!" Moby appeared in the hallway. Mac turned pale and held the fish behind his back. From Mac's room, Griff and Viggo snuck into the hallway, and Nate watched from the other end of the hall. "Whatcha got there?"

"Nooothhiiinnnggg…" Mac took a step away.

"Aw, c'mon mate, show me!" Moby stared him down, and then grabbed Mac's arm. He arched an eyebrow. "That… is my fish." Mac gaped at him. "It sure looks like it."

"Uh, no, no, no it's not, no, no way" Mac shook his head frantically, "I was just at the fish store, and I got this! His name is-" a two second pause, "Julub."

"Julub." Moby repeated dubiously. Mac nodded vigorously.

"Julub! He's my best friend in the world and you caaannn't take him awaaaay from meeee!" He started sobbing, falling to the floor, holding his fish protectively. Moby stared at him, wide-eyed. "I looovveee him!" Mac went into completely hysterical sobs. "He's my only friend and he understands me, and I love him soooo much, pleaaassseeee don't take him awaaaayyy from meee! NooOoooOooo…"

"Whatever you say, dude. Have fun with… Julub." He backed back into his room and shut the door, and they heard his voice from behind the door, "psycho…"

"Julub?" Nate said, as Viggo said the same thing. Mac watched as Nate turned and bolted back into his room, and Viggo ran right into the door that he never realized Griff had closed behind them.

" _Ow!"_ Viggo flung the door open, then slammed it behind him.

"And they say I'm crazy?" Mac asked the wall. Griff, however, responded, even if the wall didn't.

"I've never heard the name Julub before."

"That's cuz I made it up, kid." Mac got to his feet, "I'm gonna go find him a bowl."

"We're leaving for the race in like, two minutes."

"Perfect" Mac grinned.

After the race- the results were unexciting, although there were a great number of "accidental" punches thrown between Moby and Nate, and Mac kept his fish hidden in the gondola and spent the race hoping no one accidentally kicked it out of the car- Mac was in the Grey Base kitchen going through the cabinets, one hand holding the baggie containing Julub.

"What're you  _doing?"_ Elise pushed him aside to get at the coffee pot.

"Jeeze, are you addicted to caffeine or what?" Mac reached for a mug, but decided against it. It was too small for a fish to live in.

"Shut up, Mac." Elise made herself coffee, then watched him while it boiled. "So what are you doing?"

"Nothing." He found a flower vase above the refrigerator. "Perfect!" He filled it with water, then carefully transferred Julub from the baggie to the vase. "He needs a  _forest"_ He raced out of the room, holding the case carefully.

Viggo was walking by outside, when he tripped on… nothing. He looked around, then saw a foot. "Mac?" Mac pushed himself up from behind the tree.

"Yo." Viggo looked from Mac's vase to the small tree branch in Mac's other hand.

"Uh… what's with the branch? And the… vase?"

"Julub's new home" Mac got to his feet, and stuck the pine branch into the vase. Julub swam around it, as there was only a small margin of area around the branch. "He's got his own forest now."

"I see…" Viggo was only a few feet away, though, before Mac decided to continue his current career as Mac the Spicer-Upper.

"I told Nate that you completely flipped out when you found out about him" he said suddenly. Viggo froze.

"What'd he say to that?" Viggo didn't look at Mac. "Did he even care? If he didn't… don't tell me. He didn't, did he?" head hung, he started walking away again. Mac ran after him, careful not to drop Julub's vase, and stepped in Viggo's path.

"He cared, dawg. He cared a lot." Mac thought, for a brief second, that there was still some sort of hope in the situation. He couldn't tell at all what Nate was thinking, but he knew that, despite everything, Viggo still really liked Nate. Judging from his reaction to Nate's secret shame, Mac was willing to bet that Viggo really loved him.

Viggo drew in a breath. "You must be mistaken." And then he walked away.

"You know what?" Mac said to Julub, watching Viggo go into the Grey Base, "I should just lock them in a room together and make them talk it out."

Then Mac grinned.


	14. The gear room: Now

"So, um, how is… Julub?" Viggo tapped on the glass vase that was sitting on the dresser, peering through the pine branch that was still stuck into the vase. "Are you sure he's still in here?"

"Yup" Mac didn't look up from his game. He'd had to restart it. "I just checked two minutes ago."

"Don't fish usually like… I dunno… kelp or whatever? Not… trees?"

"Julub is unique." Mac turned off his game, just as Moby walked into the room.

"Mate, I could have sworn that's my fish. Mine totally vanished, too, just this week." He looked at the fish. "I think one of them ate him." He paused, then gave Mac a curious look. "Or is this…?"

"No!" Mac jumped to his feet.

"Seriously, mate, I'm convinced you stole my fish…" Moby had a look of thoughtfulness on his face that alarmed Mac.

"You're not going to take him, are you? Pleasseee, nooooooo… he's the highlight of my life…." Mac fell to his knees on the ground, hugging Moby's legs, "NOT JULUB! ANYONE BUT JULUB!" Moby tried to shake him off but couldn't.

"Mac, I-"  
"TAKE VIGGO INSTEAD!"

"Hey!" Viggo looked up sharply.

"Speaking of that-" Moby began, but Mac swiftly smacked him in the leg.

"Hey, Viggo, I forgot to tell ya, Allegra wanted to talk to you, she's at the pool."

"What's she want with me?" Viggo glanced back over his shoulder. Mac paused.

"Something about… a…" another Mac-typical pause. "Wall."

"A wall." Viggo repeated dubiously. Mac nodded, eyes wide with innocence.

"Just go. She said it was important." Viggo shrugged and walked off. As soon as he left, Mac leapt up and dragged Moby down the hallway, up a flight of stairs, and into the lounge, where he'd told his chosen people to meet. This group included Moby, Elise, Griff- mostly because Mac couldn't get rid of him- Zoe, and Kaori. Psymon and Allegra weren't there, because he was too scared to ask. At the moment, though, Elise and Griff were the only ones missing. "Where's Elise?" he asked. "And Griff?"

"Probably late. What do you want, Mac?" Zoe asked him. Mac crossed his arms over his chest.

"I'll tell you all at once."

Griff, meanwhile, was trying to convince Nate not to come with him to the lounge. "Wait!" Griff exclaimed, standing in front Nate in the hallway. "I forgot to tell you something." Nate arched an eyebrow.

"What?"

"I, um…" Griff paused. "I forgot."

"So… can I go now?" Nate made to step around him, but Griff scrambled back in front of him.

"Wait! I remembered. It was… um…"

"Nate!" Elise's voice carried through the hallway. Nate turned slightly pale and, Elise noticed, seemed to check that the sleeves of his jacket weren't pushed up.

"Uh… hi." He stepped back, but she strode forward anyways. "What?" Elise spotted the open door to the hotel's gym, which was usually empty.

"AIIIEEEE!" She screamed, pointing through the open door and jumping back. Of course, Nate turned to see what she was pointing at. Elise dove forward and shoved him through the doorway, slamming it shut behind him.

"Hey!" He tried to open the door, but she didn't let go of the handle. "Elise!"

"What's up?" Allegra came down the hall with Psymon.

"Do me a favor, and keep this door closed."

"Sure." Allegra and Psymon stayed outside the door, while Elise and Griff went into the lounge.

"This had better be real good, Mac. It wasn't that easy to lose Nate." Elise sat in one of the leather chairs.

"It's great, trust me." Mac surveyed his collected helpers. "I have a brilliant genius idea." He grinned, but no one else seemed to share his enthusiasm. "I'm going to lock Nate and Viggo into the Grey Base's gear room." This earned him only blank stares.

"That's a bloody stupid idea" Moby offered finally. "Why would you want to do that to those two in particular? Hell, I'd be just as alright if you locked Elise and yourself in a room. Who cares?"

"Hellooooo, dude, the two are goin' at it like- like-" Mac paused. "Well, they're not talking. Which ticks me the hell off! And also, I don't like sharing my room with two people. I don't get as much space for my stuff!"

"There's this funny little invention in your room, Mac" Zoe rolled her eyes. "It's called a dresser. You haven't seemed to have discovered it yet. Why don't you go look?"

"Very funny. No, but, seriously, is it just me noticing this?" He looked around for some sort of confirmation.

"You are right, Mac-kun" Kaori agreed first, nodding her head so her pigtails bobbed up and down. "They are both acting very strangely."

"Yeah," Moby was next to agree, "cuz the Swede was always in your face and too damn confident before, and now he's all quiet, and the cowboy was actually kind of cool to hang out with, and now he's seriously on edge constantly."

"That's what I'm  _talkin_ about!" Mac yelled, grinning. "So, who wants to help? You just have to get them both into that room. I'm sure they'll, like… talk it out or whatever once they're there."

"It'll be easy to get either one in there" Zoe snickered. "They're both kinda gullible."

She was proved right even as she spoke. Viggo was, at the moment, looking around the empty area, utterly confused as to why Allegra was not actually there, and Nate was in the gym, still hammering on the door and yelling.

Both were, admittedly, a little gullible sometimes.

…………..

"Hey, Nate!" Moby ran into the front room of the base. Everyone was there, having finished the races for the day already. "Your snowboard got cracked, mate!"

"What?!" Nate stared at him, shocked. Moby nodded vigorously.

"Totally cracked, you should go look." But Nate paused.

"Where is it?"

"The gear room!"

"No it's not" Nate gave him a bewildered look. "It's right over there." He pointed behind him where his snowboard was indeed lying on the ground.

"Oh, right, my mistake." Moby sulked back to the kitchen. "Didn't work" he said to Elise and Zoe. Zoe grinned.

"Just tell him Elise is looking for him, and he'll run away."

"Very funny" Elise sneered. She went to the doorway of the kitchen. "Nate, Moby's just stupid, he didn't mean your snowboard, he meant… your new goggles." Nate shook his head.

"I don't have any…"

At the same time, Griff and Viggo were outside, watching Mac collect pine needles for Julub. Mac and Griff had both tried already to get Viggo to go into the gear room, but he hadn't believed that it was on fire (Mac's idea) or that it was being invaded by aliens (Griff's idea).

"Really" he said, looking between them. "If it was, why would I go over there?" Neither could think of a good reason. Mac was starting to think his idea was hopeless, when Kaori ran out.

"Viggo-kun! Psymon just shredded your really nice jacket!" she wailed, and he stared at her, wide-eyed.

"No way! Not the one with the fur on the hood?"

"I really am very sorry, Viggo-kun"

"Maybe I can still save it" Viggo ran inside. All three stared after him.

"Kaori" Mac finally said, "he's  _wearing_ the jacket with the fur on the hood."

"Oh. I guess he did not notice?" Kaori held up her gloved hands in confusion. "Viggo-kun is not thinking straight today."

"Is he ever?" Mac sighed, then returned to finding Julub more foliage for his vase. As Viggo rushed past the living room, Zoe decided they couldn't waste any more time. She marched into the living room, grabbed Nate by the hood, and dragged him out of the room.

"Uh, Zoe-" he tried to get out of her reach, but she just yanked him along the hallway.

"Shut up." They got to the gear room.

"Liars!" Viggo's voice came from inside. "It's not even here- oh… wait…" Zoe flung Nate through the doorway, where he promptly fell over a snowboard, and slammed the door shut. Nate stood and looked around. The gear room was a small room in the side of the Grey Base building, which was just where all the boarders threw the stuff they weren't using. There was a collection of snowboards, jackets, scarves, gloves, and boots, all thrown across the bench that ran along the wall. Viggo was standing in the center of the room. When he saw Nate, he went straight to the door and tried the handle. When he found it was locked, he mumbled a long string of curses.

"Sorry, dudes!" Mac's voice came through the door. "Door handle broke off! We're fixin' it, don't even worry, just chill for a while."

"Sure it broke" Viggo mumbled. He went over to sit on the end of the bench, stubbornly not looking at Nate.

"You see?" Mac whispered to the others once they were out of earshot. "They'll have made up in no time."

Nate was aware of Viggo snubbing him, and wasn't quite sure what to do about it. He understood why, of course. According to Mac, Viggo had flipped out when he'd seen Nate's self-injury scars, so Nate didn't expect to be forgiven. And besides that- besides that, Viggo had finally told him right out why Nate's comment nearly a month ago had hurt him so much. And of course, Nate was exactly right. Viggo wasn't going to talk to him, and he was still half-horrified, half-embarrassed that he'd confessed to liking Nate so much.

The room remained completely silent.

Mac spent the next four hours wandering through the forest, looking for stuff for Julub's vase. Upon returning with an armful of pinecones and leaves, however, he realized that the vase was too small.

"Is there a, like, tank in the kitchen or something?" he asked Elise.

"Of course not."

"Can I have the coffee pot?"

"I'd kill you first." Mac deposited all the stuff on the kitchen table.

"Hey, mate" Moby stuck his head through the doorway. "There's a big glass tank thing they used for the flower display at the winner's whatever last year."

"Awesome!" Mac punched the air with his fist, "where is it?!"

"In the- oh, no."

"What?"

"The gear room."

"Shit!" Mac turned and ran for the door. "We forgot about Nate and Viggo…" He skidded around the corner of the hallway and wrenched open the door of the gear room. Nate and Viggo both looked up at him. They were sitting at opposite ends of the bench, not looking at each other. "Uh…" Mac looked back at the door. "Fixed the handle."

"About fucking time" Nate growled, stalking by.

"I was  _wearing_ the jacket" Viggo snapped when he brushed by Mac. "The handle was never fucking broken, was it?!" he stormed off. Mac went in and retrieved the tank.

"It didn't work" he announced to the people in the kitchen when he returned, lugging the tank. "They're still not speaking."

"So your brilliant idea was a total failure?" Moby said helpfully. Mac scowled.

"I hate you."

"Nice plan" Elise rolled her eyes. "How about we just take the smart plan now?"

"What's that?" Mac started filling the tank up with water. He looked at Elise's coffee cup. "Do fishes like coffee?"


	15. Everything has more than one reason: Now

 "EEEEEEEEAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!"

If everyone had been irritated the first time a scream had woken them up too early in the morning, they were even more enraged the second time.

"IT'S ONLY ONE FUCKING THIRTY IN THE MORNING!" Psymon roared.

"What the hell is wrong with that kid?!" Moby groaned.

"Mac-kun, what is wrong?" Kaori was the one voice of sympathy.

"I SWEAR I DIDN'T DO ANYTHING TO YOUR GAME!" Griff shouted unnecessarily.

"MAC, YOU'RE DEAD!" Zoe and Allegra screamed in unison. Nate didn't respond, and whatever Viggo said was impossible to understand, whether because it was in indelicate Swedish or because he was buried under blankets, it was hard to say.

"ELISE! ELISE! ELISE!" Mac went careening down the hallway to hammer on the door to the room Elise and Kaori shared. Elise yanked open the door so quickly Mac almost fell forward.

"Mac, it's one thirty in the damn morning. What do you want?!" Elise snapped.

"Well… remember when you said that there was a better solution to that whole problem with those two guys?"

"Yes…"

"What is it?" Mac asked innocently. Elise stared at him.

" _That's_ what you woke everyone up for?!"

"Um… so, what's the solution?"

"Let them work it out for themselves!" Elise shouted, throwing her hands up into the air. "For heaven's sake, Mac, let them sort it out and stop waking us up before sunrise!"

"HE'S NOT GONNA BE AROUND TO DO THIS EVER AGAIN!" Psymon's howl sounded closer, so Mac took off running.

*

"Viggoooooo, help me with Julub's tank" Mac struggled with the huge tank, water nearly sloshing over the sides as he staggered through the front room of the Grey Base.

"Why?" Viggo was sprawled across the black couch, listlessly watching Mac.

"I wanna get him more foliage."

"You can't possible fit any more freakin' branches into that tank" The tank was already overflowing with pine branches, so many that it was hard to see Julub. "Besides, there's a snowstorm outside, in case you didn't notice."

"Oh… really?" Mac looked crestfallen. "Damn." He turned around and made his way back to the kitchen. It was silent for a moment.

"No!" Elise's voice was heard. "You are going to come with me-"

"Elise…" Nate's weary sigh could hardly be heard over her. Viggo looked up slightly, and saw Elise dragging Nate out of the hallway and into the living room. She shoved him into a chair, and stood in front of him, arms crossed, glare fierce. Nate slid down in the chair, watching her with anxiety-filled brown eyes.

"No. You're going to stay right there and tell me what the hell you were thinking, because I don't  _care_ what everyone says, I want to hear it from  _you!"_ Nate was silent after Elise's outburst.

"What do you want to know?"

"What? I want to know-"

"Why?" Nate suggested, a weak note in his voice that made Elise's glare soften a touch.

"No. I want to know if it's over, or if it's something that's… never going to go away." This was followed by a silence.

"Both." Nate mumbled.

"So… what's that supposed to mean? That you'll do it again?" With a shock, Viggo realized what they were talking about. He didn't move, watching Nate try to explain the reason and the emotion behind his scars.

"I… I don't know. I don't think so. But… it never goes away. It can't" Nate dropped his gaze from Elise's face. "I might not be like that anymore, but… I don't think I'll ever get rid of that. It's too… too much to forget."

"But you just said, it's over!" Elise cried out. Nate bit his lip, still not able to look at her.

"Yeah. But… you don't forget something like that, because it changes you, and it makes everyone treat you differently once they find out!" something of anger came into his voice again, and he looked back up at Elise. "Don't try to say you aren't doing that, too. You think I'm a totally different guy now, don't you? That's why you're doing this." Elise didn't deny it, remaining silent. "That's not  _fair,_ Elise, cuz I'm still the same as I was two minutes before you found out! It doesn't change anything!"

"It does" Elise insisted quietly. "Before that, I didn't know what you'd done to yourself before!"

"Maybe not directly" Nate's voice dropped to a haunted quietness. "But you knew me. And that was part of me, even if you didn't know it. You just didn't know that this is what made me something of who I am. But you've known the effects of it, even if you didn't recognize what caused it."

This was too true for Elise to debate, so she left in silence. Nate let her go.

Viggo wasn't sure if Nate was aware he was there or not. He stayed silent, their argument still echoing in the nearly-empty room. What Nate had said didn't match up to what Viggo knew. What he'd said was so similar to the argument Viggo had used before, when a friend confronted him on the subject of his sexual orientation. And Viggo had always argued the truth, that they might not have known it word for word, but they knew him, and that was a part of him, and that nothing had changed, they'd just found a name to put to a fraction of his personality. And that was where Nate was being inconsistent. If he got that same treatment, for a different reason, Viggo couldn't understand how he could have been so hypocritical, to stop speaking to Viggo upon finding out he was gay. He was affected by that same principle, so Viggo couldn't figure out how Nate could justify hurting someone else in the same way he himself had been hurt.

But, a whisper in Viggo's mind brought one more thought for his consideration, and he wasn't sure what to think anymore. He glanced over at Nate, who was watching the doorway where Elise had gone, unaware Viggo was even there. Viggo's thoughts reeled slowly, unsteady, unsure,  _maybe I misunderstood._

*

The snowstorm had made it impossible to race, or even leave the Grey Base. Everyone had dispersed around the Base, finding more and more creative pastimes. Mac was redecorating Julub's tank in the kitchen, adding in rocks and apple seeds he was sure would grow into trees. Griff was playing hide and seek with Mac, and was hiding in the gear room, unaware that Mac had stopped playing half an hour ago. Moby was playing poker with Zoe and losing. Kaori was dancing around their table, the self-appointed cheerleader, exclaiming  _"ooooh,_ Moby-kun, you should not have done that!" every time he put down a bet. Psymon and Allegra were nowhere to be seen, but for some reason, there wasn't any fruit to be found around the house, save for the apples Mac had confiscated for Julub's tank. Elise was reading in her room, and Nate and Viggo were still in the living room, neither one willing to be the one to leave and appear weaker. Nate was scanning a magazine, and Viggo was flipping through the TV channels at warp speed. The soundtrack to this was more amusing to him than the shows themselves.

"-it's like a sponge, cleaning your shower has never been- EAAUUGGHH IT'S GOT ME- but I love you, I never wanted you to- dissect his eye- come back here with that, Katie, that is not a toy!- this is a thousand year old- chicken!- and vegetarians everywhere are excited for this- fruit salad, vegetable salad, pasta salad, be creative- what do you mean, you lost it?!- fifty miles an hour, are you aware that we're in a residential area?- call now for a- call this number- you deserve to go to  _bleeeeeep_ \- IT'S GOT ME AGAIN!" Viggo grinned and kept on going through the channels. He glanced at Nate again, saw a flicker of amusement on his face, even as he pretended he wasn't listening.

"Has it stopped snowing yet?" Viggo asked. It took Nate a moment to realize that Viggo was actually talking to him.

"No."

"Think it'll stop soon?"

"Doubt it." They fell silent again, save for the entertaining sounds of the TV. "Gonna stop on a channel soon?"

"Naah. This is better." Viggo kept flipping.

Another silence.

"Seen Allegra and Psymon around?" Viggo asked next.

"Nope."

"Concerning."

"Definitely."

A longer silence.

"Do you hate me?" Viggo's gaze darted over to Nate at the question. He struggled for an answer.

"I can't." Viggo answered bluntly.

"Do you want to?" Intensely anxious eyes watched Viggo. Viggo hesitated.

"I don't know."

The silence following silence was so long that Mac, watching from the kitchen, nearly threw an apple into the room, just to get them to say something. Elise ended up breaking the mood, when she swept through the room on her way to the kitchen.

"Elise-" Nate started to say. She didn't give any sign that she'd heard him. "Elise! You can't seriously hate me because of  _this?"_

"I don't" Elise said, but it was so obviously a lie that Nate couldn't even look at her. Elise nearly ran into Mac when she turned into the corner of the kitchen.

"Hey-"

"Shhh" Mac shushed her, crouching down by the doorway to listen to what was, currently, only silence.

"I don't hate you because of that." Viggo offered up quietly. Nate shrugged a shoulder, saying nothing. But Viggo could tell what he was thinking-  _you hate me anyways._ "I mean… I couldn't, not because of something like that." Viggo ventured finally. He pushed himself up, to watch Nate better, pushing his blonde hair out of his eyes.

"Oh." Nate said softly. "Good to know."

"What I mean is… I dunno. Just… if you don't like how she's doing this…" Viggo drew in a breath, trying to level out his anger before he spoke, "how come you're also doing it  _yourself?!"_ His biting words almost made Nate flinch.

"You really think I'd do that, don't you?" He spoke coldly, hiding how hurt he was. Viggo was terrified he'd just about made Nate cry, because no matter how angry he was, he didn't want to hurt Nate. But it was obvious he already had. "There's an alternative to everything, Viggo. Everything's got more than one reason, and you're just not seeing it."

Then he turned away and Viggo could feel it.

He'd lost Nate.

 

 


	16. Everything, Lost: Now

 Moby leaned forward on the snowmobile, the Grey Base in sight. He could hear the dull roar of Zoe's snowmobile somewhere close behind him and he tried to nudge his own forward more.

_Thud. Thud. Thud. Thud._

He jerked the snowmobile in random zigzage, trying to see why the snow had suddenly become so uneven.

"Ha!" Zoe zoomed up behind him, but was soon drawn into the jerky pattern he'd taken on, trying to avoid the strange bumps in the snow. "What the hell, are those rocks?!" Moby opened his mouth to reply, but his snowmobile struck some…  _thing_ in the snow, and he flew over it. Zoey burst out laughing as Moby rolled thorough the snow. He ended up sprawled on the snow a good ten feet from his snowmobile, staring at… an orange.

"What the hell is this?" his voice was muffled by the snow, and he spat out the powder as he got up. "I ran over a pineapple?!"

"There's… fruit. Everywhere." Zoe jumped off her snowmobile and kicked at one of the lumps in the snow, unearthing a pomegranate. Another kick turned up a banana.

"HA! HA! YES! YES!" Psymon's voice resounded through the nearly-empty clearing. "YOU HAVE STUMBLED UPON THE SACRED BURIAL GROUND OF THE FRUIT DEMONS! FEAR THEIR WRATH!" Psymon was standing on the rooftop of the Grey Base. In the light of the falling sun, he was silhouetted against the navy sky, looking like he'd just been thrown out of heaven, after fifteen accounts of disturbing the peace up there.

"So that's what he and Allegra were doing with all that fruit…" Zoe muttered. Before they could say anything else, though, the door to the lodge was flung open, and slammed shut. Angry footsteps were heard on the porch.

"Moby!" Nate shouted, appearing at the side of the deck. Moby stood up.

"What?" The edge in his voice displayed for everyone to see that he hadn't forgotten their fight.

"Mac stole your fish!" Nate declared. A scream was heard from inside the lodge.

"NATE DON'T TELL HIM!  _NOOOOO!_ " Mac wailed. There was a crashing noise. Then the door opened, and a slightly dazed Mac stumbled out. "Damn door…" he muttered.

"Nate, how come you're all wet?" Zoe asked. Nate glowered; clearly, this was the wrong question to ask. He was, however, completely drenched, water making his shirt stick to his chest, jeans soaked, and he'd left wet footprints across the deck where he'd walked.

"Mac ran into me with Julub's tank" Nate snarled through clenched teeth. Mac saw Moby, and froze.

"He's lying, you know" Mac called out to Moby, "totally didn't steal him. He's mine. From the pet store." Moby gave no sign of believing him. Mac ran at the porch railing, vaulted over and threw himself at Moby's feet. "DON'T TAKE HIM AWAY FROM ME!" Mac sobbed. Moby tried to step away, but Mac clung to his ankles. "I LOVE JULUB!"

"Um…"

Back in New Metro City, however, things were less entertaining. Elise, Allegra, Viggo and Kaori were sitting in the classy restaurant, at a table adorned with small dishes that held overpriced and undersized portions , two thin-stemmed wineglasses, and so many forks, Viggo couldn't figure out what to do with most of them. The girls had dragged him to the city under the pretense of going snowboard shopping. What they'd really wanted was to have a decent navigator, and to berate him for fighting with Nate. Again. At the moment, thought, it was almost even worse torture.

"-I liked the blue dress the best" Elise was saying.

"It was very pretty, but my favorite was the pink!" Kaori added. Viggo groaned inwardly, playing with a fork. So far, he'd figured out that he had a salad, dinner and desert fork. The other three, he'd decided, must have been for playing with, stabbing someone, and, should the need arise, collateral.

"Well?" Allegra's voice made his head snap up, because an annoyed note in her tone was usually followed by a swift kick to the shin, with a steel-toed boot.

"What?"

"Why'd you go and provoke that?" Elise repeated the question. Viggo felt a blush creep into his cheeks, not quite ready to identify if it was anger or embarrassment that caused it.

"He started it" Viggo mumbled.

"Actually, you did" Allegra chirped, probably just to piss him off. Viggo twirled the end of the fork between his fingers.

"I just wanted to know" Viggo clenched his teeth, reluctant to elaborate. Which he knew, of course, he would have to do anyways.

"What?" Elise pressed. Viggo drew in a breath.

"Why he was being so damn hypocritical. That's what I wanted to know."

"About what, Viggo-kun?" Kaori, Viggo had recently learned, had been watching the interactions the entire time, like the other girls. It annoyed Viggo at how oblivious he'd been towards how obvious their fighting was, however passive-aggressive it may have been.

"He said to Elise that she shouldn't hate him because of what he'd- he'd done to himself, before" He couldn't say the words, couldn't, they made him shudder and made his breath catch in a threat of tears, because, hate it now as he did, he cared for the cowboy. "because he was still the same, and that it had always been a part of him, even if she couldn't put a name to it."

"There's a different between knowing and not knowing" Elise said, somewhat primly.

"Shut up, we'll fight about that later" Allegra looked at her innocently over the edge of her wineglass, eyes wide as if she hadn't just sparred at her yet again. Elise sighed and let Viggo continue.

"So I asked why he was being so hypocritical, to be doing the same thing to me." Viggo concluded.

"In what way?" Allegra interrupted. Viggo looked away.

"He found out I'm gay, and stopped talking to me. But when I said that…" His grip on the fork tightened, catching it on the edges, and it clattered to the table. "he got really mad at me. He said he couldn't believe I could think that he could do that."

"So he didn't?" Kaori questioned. Viggo shrugged.

"How should I know what he means? I never do. Maybe he doesn't think he's being hypocritical. Or maybe I just really fucked up. I don't know."

"You should apologize" Kaori gave her end-all-be-all idea. Viggo shook his head. "Why no?"

"Because" Viggo took up the fork again, spinning it between his thumb and forefinger, "he's through listening."

*

Allegra awoke to a soft knock at the door to the hotel room she and Zoe shared. When she dragged herself out of bed and opened the door, she found Psymon standing in the hall.

"It's two in the morning, Psymon" she whispered. He grinned.

"Precisely." Allegra didn't question it, just grabbed a jacket and followed him down the hallway. Once they arrived at a hotel door, he took a room key from his pocket and opened it. "Shh." Mac's room, evident from the clothing strewn out across the floor and furniture. "We're gonna take everything."

"Everything?" Allegra whispered back.

"Oh, yeah." Both Mac and Griff were heavy sleepers, so they didn't even notice while Psymon and Allegra quietly dragged away all the furniture and luggage that belonged to Mac.

"Hey" Viggo whispered, stirring. He was curled up on his bed, made from the comforters and extra blankets, on the floor.

"Go back to sleep" Psymon commanded. Viggo shrugged and dozed off again. Psymon and Allegra then moved to complete the next part of their plan.

When Mac woke up, he was on the floor. "Um…?" and the only stuff left in the room was Griff's bed, Viggos' bed, and their luggage. His own was gone, as was every other piece of furniture. And something else was gone, too. "JULUB!"

The scream echoed throughout the hallway and all the hotel rooms on the floor, and probably over to the other floors, too.

"WHERE IS JULUB?! WHERE?! WHERE?!"

Viggo, meanwhile, was sitting in the lounge at a table, chin on his folded arms, watching the neon fish swim around the pine branches stuck in its tank.

"Maybe you should talk to him." Zoe's voice made him look up. Viggo shook his head no, blonde bangs falling into his eyes.

"Too late."

"Try."

"Can't."

"It's  _too late._ "

Zoe was silent for a moment, arms crossed, glaring at him.

"Okay." She finally said. Viggo lifted his head. "But I bet you anything that you'll spend the rest of your life searching for someone to be with, who reminds you of him, because that's as close as you'll get to what you really want. That's what he is to you."

"Lost" Viggo said flatly. "he's just lost to me."

"No." Zoe's voice was unwavering. "He's everything to you.

She left. Viggo was completely silent.

 

 


	17. Nothing's Fair: Now

Word had gotten around, just like it always did on the circuit. And Moby had just received the whole story from Allegra. "That's why he got so pissed off when you said he'd messed up everything between him and Viggo" she concluded cheerfully, "right before you guys got in a fight."

"I see." Moby stood up, tossing the snowboard wax from hand to hand. "Very interesting. So what's going on now?" Allegra shrugged.

"They stay mad and never talk again, I guess. Viggo's convinced Nate hates him for being gay, Nate's sure Viggo thinks he's a jerk and is offended he could think that, and no one really knows why it all started."

"I blame Nate." Moby picked up his snowboard, starting back towards the lodge. Allegra followed him.

"No, that's the thing. There's a gap between what he did and why. Which is why Viggo flipped out."

"So they're both to blame." Moby reached the deck, dropped his snowboard on the ground. "Only one way to take care of that, isn't that right?"  
"Um… what way?"

"Where's Nate?"

Moby found Nate, who was out practicing, just about to start the track. "NATE!" he yelled. Nate turned back, and reluctantly slowed down.

"What do you want?" The hesitance on his face spoke lengths about the detail in his memory of their fight.

"You're going to tell me what the hell's going on with you and Viggo." Moby crossed his arms over his chest, the embodiment of stubbornness.

"No." Nate stood his ground.

"No."

"No, I don't  _want_ to explain it to  _you._ Hell, I don't want to explain it to  _anyone,_ and it's hardly fair to expect me to want to!"

"I don't  _care_ what you want." Moby snapped. "Cuz you know what, mate? Things get screwed up all the time. Relationships get thrown away and people get hurt and mistakes get made. It happens all the damn time. People deal with it, cuz they  _have_ to. It's not fair, and it's not unfair, cuz it happens to the whole freakin' world." Nate didn't move, gaze steady on Moby's face. Moby didn't back down. "But when it's something that's possible to fix, and you _don't,_ that's what's unfair. Unfair is when you have to watch something fall apart when you  _know_ that you could have saved it. That's unfair, mate, and that's what's happening right now. So I want  _you_ to tell  _me_ what the  _hell_ is going on!"

Nate remained silent for a full minute. Moby was willing to wait it out all day.

"Fine." Nate finally said, teeth clenched and gaze unrelenting. "If you want to go make the world fair, fine by me. But you forget that there are people involved, and nothing can work out exactly the way you think it will when you're dealing with  _people."_

"Just tell me and I'll be the judge, got it?" Moby spat, glare even.

"What exactly do you know?"

"Not much past the beginning."

"Fine." Nate said again, and, again, the strain in his voice spoke of how very far from fine everything really was. "Turns out Viggo was so… so hurt, because he liked me." He hesitated.

"You mean  _likes."_

"I know what I  _mean"_ Nate snapped, "and I  _mean_ that once he realizes what I intend to do, he won't anymore."

"What's that?"

"Absolutely nothing." Moby was silent after this.

"There's something you're still not telling me." He said, each word weighted with deliberation, "and that's  _why._ I know you hurt him. I just want to know why you were so shocked to find out he's gay."

"Him being gay throws off everything" Nate shot back, "because when he wasn't, I was safe. I've told you this before."

"Yeah. But you never told me why." The icy wind that was tearing through the clearing picked up more, audible in the silence.

"Because" Nate finally snarled, "I fucking love him, and I can't handle that."

*

Zoe had always seen Moby as some sort of catalyst in life. Whenever she wanted to get something done- from finishing a book to going to the beach- once he was informed, it was tossed onto a no-detours, one-way path there. It was a rather useful trait of his, and as he crossed the living room of the Grey Base, she saw the determined look on his face she so recognized.

"Whatcha doin?" she called over from the couch.

"Workin on something," was his vague response, "Where's Viggo?"

"What?" Viggo's voice came from the kitchen, where Moby found him watching Mac, who was whining about how the apples weren't growing in Julub's tank.

"Go practice" Moby commanded. Viggo arched an eyebrow, leaning back in the kitchen chair.

"Uh… why?"

"Do it."

"Um… okay"

"And also-" Moby added as Viggo stood to leave, "just by the way. Talk to Nate sometime eventually."

"O…kay…" He wasn't about to argue with that tone, so twenty minutes later, he was up at the top of the empty track, wondering about Moby's motives.

Nate, meanwhile, was meandering down the course in zigzags, more focus invested in his anger towards himself than on practicing. He knew he hadn't been the nicest to Viggo over the course of the circuit, but he could justify that, if only to himself- he'd been trying to hide the fact that he was so taken by the guy. As the tour wore on, he was able to spend more time near Viggo, despite the gradual transition from liking him to being in love with him. And now Nate just couldn't get over how close he'd been. A different tone, different words, and a lot more skill with expressing his true emotions, and he knew that he could be with Viggo. Except he couldn't deal with it, couldn't handle one more thing people would resent him for. Self injury was one thing he hadn't known the consequences of before he'd started. He'd seen it as a solution, however temporary. He hadn't known it was to become the eternal problem, which, whenever people found out about, made him seem emotionally unstable no matter how recovered he was. He hated the way people he knew and trusted would suddenly turn away from him upon learning that. And Nate couldn't handle something  _else_ like that.

Viggo soon discovered why Moby had sent him out to practice. He saw Nate further up ahead, clearly not trying to break any records other than slowest time. He was weaving around trees, slow enough that someone could have walked faster. Remembering Moby's insistence, he sped up.

The sound of a snowboard skimming over the snow made Nate look back. Viggo came up beside him, and they both slowed to a stop. "Hey…" Viggo started hesitantly, "I was thinking… it really wasn't fair of me to not listen to your reasons for… doing what you did."

"Yeah" Nate agreed softly. "I'm sorry."

"Why'd you…?"

"I…" Nate hesitated, unwilling to bring this upon himself.

"I already went first" Viggo offered a half smile. "I flipped because I seriously like you. Okay? I'm vulnerable here, it's your turn." He tried to sound causal and flip, but there was a tremble to his voice that made his statement true. He hadn't ever felt more vulnerable, putting himself totally defenseless before the guy he'd fallen in love with, first willingly, then against his will, now… he didn't know how he felt about it, just that it wouldn't ever go away. Nate's gaze fell to the snow.

"I guess… when I found out you're gay, I… it's like… I'm not safe anymore." He fell back on his only way of explaining it without telling everything. A hurt look appeared on his face.

"I'm not gonna-" Viggo started to mumble, but Nate jumped in.

"No, no, not you. It's not you" he hastened to add in. Curious brown eyes met his. "In all fairness..."

"Nothing's fair anymore. Never was. What are you trying to say?" Viggo said, in a tone that would have been insistent if he hadn't looked so hurt.

"I… I just couldn't deal with it, because… it didn't matter, before, if you were or not, or whatever"

"So it's like you were saying, once you can put a name to something…" Viggo ventured, weaker than before, Nate's responses becoming more and more hurtful, much as Nate tried to avoid that.

"No. This is different." Viggo shrugged a shoulder at that, looking away, understanding it just the way it sounded, which wasn't what Nate had intended. Nate saw the tears in his eyes.  _I'm not going to hurt him again,_ he thought, furious with himself, for hurting Viggo so many times,  _it doesn't matter if it hurts me._ "I didn't want you to be gay, because that was too much for me, because I'm not ready to admit something like that." Viggo was silent.

"I don't get it" he whispered, looking up again, tear-filled eyes reflecting his pain.  _You're being a jerk,_ his look seemed to say,  _and all you can do is hurt me._ The anxiety and hurt finally reached Nate enough that he couldn't stand to try and explain his way in circles anymore. He didn't stop to think, just knew that it would taste of a last resort, which he was certain would mark the last day he would ever have any chance at something resembling love.

He lifted one hand to Viggo's cold cheek and pressed his lips to Viggo's.

 


	18. Honesty: Now

Nate was sure the world had come to an end. If not the entire world, then at least his potential for a pleasant one.

His confirmation on this suspicion was the fact that as soon as they broke apart, Viggo laughed.

"Honestly, Nate…." He said, shaking his head, and inwardly, Nate recoiled. "That's why you've been such an unbearable jerk to me?" Nate supposed he should have felt more downtrodden than he did, but- but Viggo was almost acting like himself again, after such a long time of that strange, sullen silence that really didn't suit him, and for which every moment it endured, Nate's heart had broken a little more.

"Yeah. That's why" Nate managed to mumble, looking away. "Sorry. I'm gonna…" he made a move as if to leave, but then Viggo reached out and grabbed him by the front of his shirt.

"You're going nowhere." He informed Nate calmly. Nate felt like crying. "Not until I get my say, too. And as I was saying, you could have saved us a lot of trouble if you'd said this earlier. And I could have saved us, too."

"But-" Nate protested weakly. Viggo shook his head no.

"But nothing, we were both stupid. Honestly." Viggo interrupted, gaze never wavering; Nate involuntarily cringed at the word 'honestly', beacuse, really, the lack of that had gotten him into this mess int he first place, and now fear was beating him senseless beacuse it looked like that was about to hurt him again, "because you know what?"

"What?" Nate nearly whispered. Viggo didn't say anything. He leaned forward, bridging the gap between them, and pressed his ice cold lips to Nate's, kissing him, sweet and hot and deep, until Nate felt like he couldn't breathe from the sheer thrill of it.

"That's what" Viggo said, the moment afterwards, while Nate tried to make any sense of what had just happened, tried to remember anything, anything but the sweet chill of Viggo's kiss, "I got offended because it sounded like I'd never, ever have a chance with you."

"Still want one?" Nate managed to ask.

"No. I want to keep you." Viggo gave him the heart-melting smile Nate hadn't seen for far too long. "Besides, I think you owe me."

"Oh?"

"Yeah. How about… there's this indulgence I'd like to give into." Viggo said, hinting shamelessly. "It has to do with you, kissing, and never, ever leaving."

"Please" Nate said, already breathless, thanking the heavens that honesty had a way of working out, "be mine."

"I think you're mine."

"And I think you're mine, in that case."

"Yeah" Viggo agreed, kissing him again, softer, longer, "I think we've earned that."

 


End file.
